Mortal Heart Volume I: Above
by Balael-666
Summary: Lilith was a practical girl - she didn't believe in ghosts or in god, and she most certainly didn't believe in love. So why is her faith in that practicality being shaken by this crazy man claiming to be her guardian angel...and madly in love with her?
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

* * *

_The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want._

I held a little boy's hand as he died today. I felt his spirit relinquish the shell of his body to stand beside me. He asked me where we were going, and I told him: "home." He asked me if his mother could come too, because he would miss her, and I told him, "no." Then he remarked that his mother would not understand. I told him that she would in time.

_He maketh me to lie down in green pastures._

This is not unlike the assurances I so often ladle out, to ease their worries and consol their loss. Yet there are days when I wonder if I am right; do my charges understand what I am or what I do, why I do it? Do they understand that I am so much more than a mere symbol of what comes to them once their mortal clocks run down? Do they understand that I am not the heartless creature they imagine me to be, that I suffer the pain of their loved ones, when they come to me, as though it were _my_ pain?

No. How could they?

_He leadeth me beside the still waters._

The Reaper, they call me. Oh yes, I have seen the pictures the artists scratch out with their expensive charcoal and fancy, chromed ink pens. They see me as a monster; a grasping, hungry, cold, cruel being that wields an iron blade with which to cut them down. I have heard the tone with which they whisper my name, as though fearful they might call down the wrathful thing they speak of, casting terrified looks heavenward. It has been so since the beginning. I know. I was there.

_He restoreth my soul._

My maker says to pity them. "Pity the mortals with their jaded fears and desperate need to define the undefined," she says. "They know nothing else. They feel you, the presence of that which they cannot see, and it alerts them to things they cannot comprehend. This frightens them, child. You must pity them for their inability to understand you and your element."

Though I cannot scorn them for their fears, their natural suspicion of the unknown, nor do I pity them. Envy is nowhere near pity.

_He __leadeth __me __in __the __paths __of __righteousness __for __His __name's __sake._

Cold, they call me. Cruel. I am cruel because I make certain they receive something that I will never have? I am cold because I do not shed tears upon every frozen hand that I touch when I bid each soul to walk with me? Hungry…I_do_ hunger. But not for what they seem to think I do.

I am not the monster they assume me to be. I do not feast upon the souls I reap. No, I hunger for what mortals were gifted with since the dawning of their race.

_Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…_

My kindred are a loving species by nature. We feel compassion; tenderness, sympathy, and a distinct fondness for the mortals we supervise and guide, yet these feelings are never more than that of a guardian. We serve as a guide and a helpful, comforting presence in everyday life.

_I will fear no evil: For thou art with me._

It is true, some of us fell for committing crimes against our maker, but these crimes were considered severe enough to threaten the balance of order, therefore reasonably punishable. Only for the very worst of sins are we cast from our home to dwell in the shadows of hell. The last to see damnation, I believe, was a guardian named Malachai.

Malachai felt the allure the mortal world holds for our kind stronger than most and was drawn by the pleasures human life contains. He lost control, engaged in intimate physical contact with a mortal woman, and paid for it with his wings. Heaven has not known his presence for over thirty-thousand mortal years.

_Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me._

They call me hungry, and I cannot deny this. I cannot lie and say that I do not envy the human race their freedom to know a love other than one of guardianship. Truthfully, I have come to believe that the gift they have received from the Almighty is one beyond their comprehension; mortals have no idea how precious their existence is. Even those church sects – with their boasts of piety – do not think to examine their so-called "sins." Never once do they pause to consider there might be reasons behind the way things are; behind multiple races, multiple religions, differences, secrets, and reproduction. It is frustrating to witness the wars wages in the names of ideas that make no fundamental sense.

_Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies._

I am, in a rough definition of the term, immortal. I have watched countless centuries pass; hundreds of ages, styles, powers and eras rise and fall, begin and end. I have escorted millions upon millions of souls to their final dwelling place, dragged kicking and screaming for mercy or silent and resigned alike. But I have never once, not _once_ in all my long existence, known what love is like.

I do not mean the maternal care of a mother or the friendly companionship of a brother; this I have in unending quantity. What I want cannot be so easily found.

I want to feel the affection I see pass between a human to only one other. I want to feel the warmth of a fire that will never succumb to shadow burning within this accursed heart, if it must feel at all. I want to know what it is to be willing to give anything and everything for the sake of another being, and to know only joy in doing so. I want to feel life, the weight of another mind tied to me, the comfort of another body beside my own.

_Thou annointest my head with oil; My cup runneth over._

I have a confession to make. Not as some paranoid Catholic schoolboy would to his priest, for no mortal priest shall ever hear the words, "forgive me, I have sinned," fall from _my_ tongue. My confession is for my own kind; for my brothers and sisters and to my maker herself. I have lost myself, surrendered my purity of mind and heart to the yearnings of mortal men.

I am in love with a human woman; a woman of such gentle nature that she pulls at my heartstrings with neither the knowledge nor intention of doing so. I have known her since her childhood, drawn to her with empathy for her timid heart and shattered world, and I am forced to admit that my originally paternal feelings have warped dramatically into such desire as I have never known before.

_Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life._

I am both delighted and ashamed to feel as I do. While this spark of adoration is clearly evidence that I am not yet lost to the good in myself, it is alarming to have such a potent emotion rise within me, and I am unsure of what to do. I want nothing more than for her to know me, to give her happiness, protection…yet she is such a cautious thing, I fear to frighten her. She is not one to listen lightly to simple words of undying love. All the same, I will do what I can to earn her trust_._

My heart is hers. Whether she will cradle it or crush it, I know not, yet so long as I may have the pleasure of just once looking into her eyes and hearing her voice directed at me, I will consider myself content.

_And I will dwell in the House of the Lord forever._


	2. I Have a Secret

**Chapter****1  
**I Have a Secret

Recommended Listening: "My Immortal" by Evanescence

* * *

Coffee, double shot with cream, was how she started her early mornings when work called her to wake and join the rest of the world on its winding journey.

She would slap the snooze on the alarm clock just before shutting it off, slip groggily out of bed, totter to the bathroom and jump in the shower. In one of those tender, little habits, she took just slightly too long under the hot water, relishing the way it cleansed and soothed and tried its hardest to lull her back to sleep. Because of it, she would rush to dress; grab her breakfast and her coffee, always made exactly the same way.

She was a creature of habit and the pattern was not difficult to follow, nor an unwanted distraction to a mind that welcomed exposure to a calmer day-to-day rhythm. He had committed it all to memory. He knew just how long it took her to get to her car in the apartment parking lot down to the number of steps. He knew exactly when she would leave – forty minutes before she was due to start right on the dot – knew how long it would take her to drive, including a cushion for traffic. Her dinner would be leftovers from a large quantity of something she would have cooked on her day off and saved in a batch for the week, which she would consume to the sound of the television and perhaps a magazine idly perused from her lap. She would leave the dishes in the sink and take care of them when she returned from class.

Dance was the embodiment of her soul in the form of motion. There was nothing she loved more than putting on her fiberglass-hardened pointe shoes and hammering away at pirouettes with her friends. It was just a sliver of the many things he knew about her.

She adored the winter season. The snow was a spectacle for which she set aside long hours to enjoy, less common and less blaring than the customary sunlight. Her most beloved sensations were those of a warm mug held between her hands and the giddy soar of her heart when she performed a difficult dance step to the perfection her body had to offer. One of her secret pleasures lay in movies that made her cry. She liked music of a gentle and raucous variety, from Beethoven and Chopin to the work of more modern bands.

Her favorite ballet to perform was Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker" because it made the children smile. Her favorite to watch and listen to was "Swan Lake" simply because it was so tragically beautiful, which was why she kept a recording of the music in the player at almost all times. Her favorite meal was spaghetti with meatballs, her favorite dessert – almost anything with chocolate that didn't contain nuts. She didn't like nuts; she thought they felt like eating wood chips. Her shampoo was for dry hair and scented with lavender, which melded nicely with the perfumes that smelled of green tea, evergreen, and sweet pea. Her favorite shoes were simple flats, preferably with thicker soles to cushion her feet, and preferably with a pair of jeans paired by a soft blouse.

Her favorite color was green; the bright green of a northwestern wood, just like that of her eyes.

He rose from the crouch with the liquidity of a mirage, back smoothly straightening and feet shifting to adopt a narrower stance as the rest of his body righted itself. For all its apparent grace, the motion was sudden, reminiscent of a solitary mind snapping violently out of a dream. It was a comparison only strengthened when his fingers gripped the metal railing of the fire escape, soft leather gloves stretching across his knuckles, a second black skin shielding his hands with the luxury in anonymity.

This had to stop. It was dangerous to be thinking of such things as the color of her eyes, even the most innocent acknowledgement of fact led to places he could not afford to wander. Mental structure and discipline reined him in, harshly backtracking to safer ground, forcing the parts that wanted so desperately to continue forward into the safety of the background.

A sigh drifted past his lips as he turned away; away from the perch he had so often occupied as of late, away from the overlooking view of Marion Street in the central district of West Seattle. It was a tiring city, taking life at an unnatural speed and clogged with pieces of the human-created waste that dredged hyper-modern societies, strewing good land with sour attitudes and lifeless, incandescent superficiality. Though it was better than most; than Chicago or New York, it was no consolation that this one spot offering mild comfort was situated just above the window that opened into her bedroom.

The breath from his lungs crushed into a growl of frustration and his hands clutched at the railing as though it had caused him pain, as if it was merely his strength that prevented the metal scaffold from leaping up and attacking him.

_No__more!_ How much agony, how much snarled, tangled unrest would tear at each cord and fiber of his heart? How much more would he have to feel before his penance was complete? When would he find the redemption promised to him all those torturous ages ago? It had been bad enough before, with the empty years eating away at his sanity. But this was much worse…so much _worse._

He extended a hand between the bars of the rickety fire escape and the burnt-brick wall, ignoring the creak of its metal joints, reaching, straining until the tips of gloved fingers touched the smooth, cool glass of the window pane. Somehow, knowing that beyond the glass lay the small sanctuary of her home did him good. Her things were tucked beyond that barrier, her dearest possessions, books, clothes, the intimacies of her life; all that made her Lilith. The stability and certainty inside that fact was an odd balm to a restless mind.

The calling of a crow pulled him by the shorthairs of awareness, raucous and shrieking. It was harsh to human ears and the passersby on the street below either scolded or ignored the bird that landed with a caw beside the man they could not see. Petite, blacker than soot, and ruffling its feathers, the crow looked at him with one round black eye. Eyeing the bird with a mixture of irritation, sadness, and faded longing. "I come, little brother," he murmured in answer to his messenger's silent, chastising appraisal, and trailed his fingertips gently down the delicate bones of the feathered creature's back.

He had a job to do. A job that would not wait while he indulged in the small, easing relief of gazing at the clear white of long-since abandoned sheets, pining and wistful. With that, he turned, moving with the steady ease of a morning wind to the platform which opened into a steep stairway and the open air.

_Redemption._

Lawbreaker.

Sinner

_…__  
_  
A picture shimmered into crystal clarity to his mind's eye, fragmented with the rippled sheen of a reflection: a girl, just past the legal proclamation of adulthood, her hair dark and pulled up into a thick knot at the back of her head. She was a delicate thing, small, soft and quiet; her step shy and quick as she walked along the sidewalk, pausing only to pull open the heavy door to a building titled _Studio__of__Dance._ A frown appeared; a tiny line at the corner of his mouth. She was walking? She shouldn't have been walking, not on streets like these. "What happened to your car? No, never mind that now."

Dropping by to make sure she was safe would be easy enough. He simply had to be patient and wait until later. Visiting her was always a cherished pastime; her presence was soothing, helped him to gather his thoughts into some semblance of order. A gentle smile tugged at his lips as he let his mind wander freely, filling itself with the beauty of the morning to replace his concerns.

He inhaled deeply and let his body fall forward.

The ripping was almost automatic, ordered by pattern and balance, called upon by the muscle of his upper back and shoulders and synchronized by knowledge of the fall. The air was chilled, but refreshing while it whipped around him, toying with his hair and his clothes, searching for something to grip. It was the currant that caught him, supported him, and he opened his eyes to watch the crow dart off in the direction of his next obligation. Powerful tendons and bones snapped and shifted, and he wheeled off to follow, sleek white feathers smoothing through the earthly wind.

_I __am __not __a __sinner._


	3. She's Come Undone

**Chapter 2  
**She's Come Undone

Recommended Listening: "Only if for a Night" by Florence and the Machine,  
"First Time Outside" by Zbigniew Preisner [From The Secret Garden]  
and "Lovers Dancing (remix)" by Innerpartysystem

* * *

_In black fields the roses grow, between crosses marked in time. _

The darkness warped. It roiled like boiling oil, contorting with the shadows of its own flesh. Twisting, convulsing, shifting, it shuddered with the convulsions of wracking sobs; desperate, needing, and hating.

It was pain and it was sadness, grieving for time and for loneliness, burning with anguish that no water could douse and no earth could smother no matter how hard it was pressed. The crying wails of emptiness filled the endless space with the echoes of shattering glass. As if a child had been ripped from its mother's arms, it rang with a piteous sorrow that would impose tears upon the most steadfast of hearts.

Streaks of red slashed the dark, velvety black expanse. Blood seeped through the ashes of a cataclysmic fire and tears streamed from the sky to dot the ground with dark splotches of wet. An unholy baptism was taking place right before her eyes.

There was a brush of feathers against her cheek, soft and gentle. A flash of silver claws preceded white wings that swept through the blackness despite being slowly, steadily swallowed by the dark ink as hope lost within mourning. The sun was a bloody red; death and decay claimed all goodness, giving one last gasp of a prayer as the stars fell to ruin.

Her eyes snapped open, her breath catching hard at the base of her throat in response to the sudden start that had woken her. The pace of her heartbeat was rapid, alarmed, her inhales as sharp and torn as though she had been out jogging – minus the painful stitch in the right side which would have been plaguing her from a run. Yet as she stared up at the ceiling and saw nothing, she closed her eyes again.

She told herself quite firmly that the images that had caused the speed of her frightened heart had only been those of a dream, created by her unconscious mind and nothing more; and certainly nothing to be afraid of. It was merely the dream, the rush of blackness and the weightless sensation of falling that had woken her.

And yet, that was wrong. The jolt hadn't been the initial shock at all.

She rolled over to squint, bleary-eyed, at the neon blue face of the digital alarm clock, where it sat beeping frantically at her t wake up. With a groan of annoyance directed toward the flashing 7:00, she reached out a small hand and slapped the snooze button – silencing the well-meaning ruckus. She was unhappy with the early time, as she always was on the days she opened for the library. But she knew that the quicker she got up and moving, the better she would feel; which was the only reason she could bring herself to shove back the covers, struggle to her feet, and stagger like a zombie to the bathroom.

The shower was part of her routine, a welcomed one that roused her sleepy self from the recesses of dreamland and made her feel less gross. A readying preparation for the day ahead. And yet, as a usual, the hot water was slightly too much of a comfort and left her racing around her bedroom, throwing clothes onto various surfaces as she looked for a pair of clean socks. Selecting a plain white blouse, she pulled a pair of pinstriped slacks over her hips while trying not to fall flat on her face.

Her coffee was a must, the final step to fully waking, and topped off by a bagel from the bread drawer while she shrugged into her jacket and slipped on a pair of shoes – showing quite an amount of balance while she did so.

Lilith knew her car was still in the shop (due to the strange clunking noises it had been making), but that didn't take away her dismay as she gazed mournfully at the empty parking space that should have housed her little '98 Toyota. The car was a trooper, being a senior citizen and temperamental, it lasted, needed little maintenance, and had excellent gas mileage. It was the first time that it had been in the shop for anything serious, so she supposed she should be thankful, but it was just so _cold_ for October.

Heaving a resigned sigh, she began a quick-paced trot down the walkway leading from the apartment campus to the road, hurrying across the apex by the wall between Sixth Avenue and Cherry Street to head toward the library where she worked. She had to be doubly careful that morning, as there was a city-wide habit of ignoring pedestrians. By the time she got to her destination, she had suffered several near-misses…all of which had nearly resulted in a Lilith-pancake or a splattering of coffee all over the sidewalk.

"I hate city streets," she groused while hurrying through the back door of the regional library, stripping off her jacket and hanging it up on an empty hook.

"_Tell_ me about it," the tall, slim redhead sitting at one of the cataloguing computers turned to return her grimace. This was Sarah, her closest friend and co-worker; a lover of gossip, pretty shoes, and boys. "There are days when I wish this city would burn to the ground just so we'd have a good excuse to make it better. Was your walk ok? I told you I could pick you up—"

"I didn't die, so I suppose that means it was ok." Lilith reasoned, flipping a hand in a dismissive gesture as she sat down at the next computer, cradling her coffee between her palms as she waited for all the appropriate programs to boot-up. Catching Sarah's look, she amended, "really, it was fine."

Sarah rolled her eyes, but changed the subject anyhow. "Halloween tomorrow," she chirped, her mood almost visibly lifting as she elbowed her friend in the ribs.

"Ok…" Lilith let the word hang, waiting for clarification as to why Sarah seemed to expect her to be more excited or enthusiastic than usual.

"The _party,_ remember? I'm hooking you up with a date—do you remember _that_, at least?"

With a mortified groan, Lilith clapped a hand to her forehead in a horror that was only partially mocking. "Yeah…I remember. But Sarah, do I really _have_ to have a date?"

"Yes," the redhead answered smoothly.

"But can't I—"

"No."

"What if I—"

"Nope," Sarah interrupted again.

Throwing her hands in the air to signal defeat, Lilith cried: "Ugh, you're _impossible!"_

Sarah's grin of victory was impish at best, and she hooked an arm around Lilith's shoulders as she confirmed, "So that means you're coming. We'll go over to my place after work tomorrow to get ready and I'll have Paul introduce you to Kevin."

Pulling out of Sarah's light grip, Lilith grabbed a stack of books waiting to be checked back in and set to the task of scanning them. She was not the partying type. Heck, she wasn't even the casually social type. Thus, the horror of a social nightmare cooked up for her reeked suspiciously like several hours of discomfort and wasted time. But Sarah was persistent, so she knew that no matter what she said, she _would_ be going. Lilith just hoped that she would be able to find a nice quiet corner to hide in until it was all over.

But what worried her even more than the prospect of drunken party-goers was the idea of a date. She didn't like boys…and being made to interact with one she didn't know did not soothe her anxieties, even after the hundredth time one of her girls informed her how silly she was for it. "So, remind me again why I'm letting you shove some guy on me?"

Sarah took a sip of her Chai tea, twisting one of her short braided pigtails between her fingers as she chatted. "Because he's cute, single, nice, and he's Paul's friend. Besides, it's not like you have to keep seeing him after tomorrow or anything. Just think of it as a double-date between friends of friends. A possibility. How're you ever going to find someone if you don't try?"

"Right…" Lilith sighed and returned her attention to scanning her book pile.

Paul, Sarah's latest boyfriend, was a nice enough guy as far as men went but Lilith wasn't keen on the idea of going out with some stranger no matter what the circumstances and side-story were. She just didn't want that kind of attention, nor did she have a need for the kind of companionship she knew Sarah wanted for her. Sarah was a head-over-heels romantic where Lilith was more-than-firmly grounded. It would never have occurred to the redhead that her logic only made sense for a girl who _wanted_ a partner. Not even if she was told straight up, word for word.

But Lilith decided to worry more about that later. For the moment she would be quite happy to finish her work day, then go home to spend the first day of her vacation (before the dreaded Halloween party) finishing the blanket she was crocheting and watching old X-files reruns. In any case, it was just one unwanted party…how bad could it possibly turn out to be?

...

There are stories parents like to tell their children before tucking them into bed at night. They are the kind where the kind, pretty peasant girl, despite finding herself in the most horrible situation imaginable, is always rescued by the handsome prince and the both of them live happily ever after. They are stories in which good always triumphs over evil, where wrongs are always put right, and the endings never leave the questions of "what next?" afterward, because how could anything bad possibly happen after such a beautiful, contented ending.

These are the stories that feed and nurture the subliminal, unconscious knowledge of what is right and good and true in young minds, later transfer themselves into values and morals as children grow older.

But what about the stories where the plot always gets darker and thicker; where eventually, every tiny sliver of light is swallowed up by the shadows, and for every good thing that happens ten more horrible events take its place. Parents never mention these stories. Whether to protect their offspring from the darkness, or because they, themselves, cannot stomach the reality that opposes a happily ever after, it is never clear.

Sometimes it seemed as though she lived in one ofthe latter; that no matter what she did, nothing could dig her out of the hole that her life had made. She had never been one to believe in things like happily ever after or that a prince of any kind would come to sweep her off her feet and miraculously make her life worth living again. Fairytales were overrated; common and excessively-printed copies of one another, all the same plot with different characters and stitched with events that were variations on a theme. Not to mention unrealistic. Life just wasn't like the fluffy, fanciful stories.

Life was dark and unreliable, with scattered traps and pitfalls that could twist even the most innocent of things into unspeakable horrors.

She hadn't looked up to a mythical tale in years. She didn't believe in fate, or destiny, just like she didn't believe in ghosts or psychics or astrology. She didn't believe that there was some God up in the heavens decreeing that all good people be given equally good lives. Bad things happened to good people just the same, after all. Heck, she didn't even think she believed in love anymore.

Love is a kind of nourishment to a child, separate from the need for food or water. When denied that nourishment, would they not starve? When deprived of the knowledge that they are wonderful and precious – as they are – what happens to the child? When parents detest or not care for their son or daughter so much that they leave them to fend for themselves, take them by the hair and beat them bloody, or even the worst of the terrible, loveless blows – _ignore_ them…the pain it causes is unbelievable. It is an unforgivable crime.

She had never quite forgiven her parents for the lack of love they had shown her. For her father's temper tantrums: alcoholic binges that caused him to go into a raging fury, and made her the perfect outlet for his fists.

She could not remember a time in her childhood when she had not been dotted with bruises, scrapes and cuts. Once, he had nearly knocked half of her teeth out. It had been a miracle that they had tightened back up while she had been asleep the very same night and she hadn't lost a one. Yet physical and verbal abuse grew to be routine. Ears had grown deaf to foul language, nerves becoming numb after short moments of blow after blow – and soon, she pitied him for being so overcome with himself that he had no way of coping other than to beat his only daughter.

Her mother, however, she didn't think she could ever forgive. She often wondered if her mother had even known she existed, and that had hurt far more deeply than any of her father's slaps, kicks, or words. His treatment had made her timid, causing her to jump at every shadow, cautious as a mouse. Her mother's denial had made her suspicious, quick to doubt, finding it difficult to trust. If a friend told her they loved her she would automatically question whether or not they were lying to her.

Because of that, she no longer believed in those long-beloved bedtime stories. And yet…she had not completely abandoned them.

Though she tried, she found she didn't have the heart to completely cast her childhood hopes away. Time had aged her, and she no longer turned to _The Twelve Dancing Princesses_ or _Beauty and the Beast_ for a world of text to get lost in aside from the occasional nod to childish fancy. Instead, she explored the vast universe of books in general, fiction and nonfiction alike. Books, she had discovered early on, held an expansive universe of knowledge all by themselves. During a particularly bad day, she could spread open the covers and bury herself in another world – the printed words whispering, ever consoling, into her ears.

Books had been her outlet to the real world. The full-time job at the local library she applied for filled her life with colloguing, cleaning, shelving, and organizing for a salary of $15.83 an hour, even despite a lack of college-level schooling. It had been an open door – a door from under which peeked a small sliver of sunshine, and the chance to make a life for herself worth trying for. She had thrown herself into her work, taking on her hours with enthusiasm and gratitude to her friendly coworkers and turning herself into an asset at the workplace.

With her wages, she was able to afford the rent on a small, clean apartment; she found herself able to keep food in her cupboards, good clothes on her back, and even had a marginal amount left over for something else.

It was this something that had the largest amount of value to her. In her adult-driven quest to expand the worth of her own life, she allowed herself to wish for a dream that had haunted her since childhood, drawn with shaky lines and colored in by wide-eyed memories of films and pictures seen through the eyes of a girl stricken by poverty of a diverse kind. She had been smart enough to never allow a single sliver of hope to wiggle its way into her mind, knowing from experience that disappointment was a hurtful thing not easily forgotten. When she suddenly realized she had the financial ability to pursue that dream, she almost didn't know how to go about it.

For as long as she could remember, Lilith had always wanted to dance. She recalled the day when a local studio had visited her elementary school to perform an adaptation of a popular children's book with the wonderment of the love-struck. Her knees and tailbone had ached for too much time sitting on a cold, thinly-carpeted floor, unmoving, yet she had barely noticed.

The dancers had moved about to the music with such grace and fluidity, almost like they were singing with their bodies, and she had known that she wanted nothing more than to do it to. As her savings began to pile up, she went in search of a studio.

Just after her seventeenth birthday, she tracked down the community center doubling as the dance school she had watched perform those years past. After a few minutes' worth of watching from the hallway outside the brightly-lit classroom, entranced as she was by the lovely exercises, the instructor asked her if she wanted to join, much to her embarrassment. She had politely refused. The very next day, however, she had beginning tuition paid, shoes and uniform bought, and had once thrown herself head-first into another new thing. Not long after, she was taking ballet, jazz, and modern dance classes four times a week.

Maybe it was a miracle, or maybe there was some psychological explanation pertaining to why the achievement of what had seemed like such an impossible wish did her so much good. Whichever it was; the closed-off young woman started to open up, make friends, and gain a social standing through the freedom and creativity of an art form. Lilith began to take real pride and joy in the days that soared by, being reared and nurtured by a normalcy that no longer harmed her.

All this, from infancy to young-adulthood, he had observed; from the shadows of evening and those left by the sunshine falling across a busy city, from the rooftops when the weather was bad.

He perched on the metal railings of a towering, self-imposed empire, still as stone, without a care for the rain that ran in tiny, iced rivers down his back and through his hair. He walked beside her down crammed, overcrowded sidewalks, dim, clouded light casting no darkened imprint where his steps should have fallen. He sat across from her on the park bench of weather-stained wood where she went to sit and read on clear days, book propped between her hands and a ready smile for the children playing nearby. Always, he observed; as if he had devoted his life to no other practice than watching hers.

It was no waste of time; he had been alive for much longer than she had, had been considered ancient decades before her parent's great, great grandparents had been born. He was older than the oldest pyramid in Egypt, had been far beyond adolescence when Queen Makeda of Sheba had gone to Jerusalem to proposition King Solomon. Eternity in youth was a much coveted gift among humankind. But life began to grow stale, dull, and empty when there was no conceivable end in sight.

Perhaps that was why he had built such an attachment to the little girl. Having something to watch – to care for from afar – distracted him from the bleak repetition of human nature. It was nothing but birthing, dying, war, and peace, with very little worth real interest in between. And since he was already so tied into dying and war to begin with, she had served as a positive breath of relief, aided his escape from the more difficult aspects of forever.

Or perhaps it was because while she was mortal, timid, and young, she was so much like him. She had shouldered the marks of pain just as he had. She had been insulted and abused, physically and emotionally, suffering as he had suffered. The only difference was that, in spite of al the reasons she had been given to view the world as an angry, jaded young woman, she had chosen instead to try and make peace with it. It was a choice he had not been strong enough to make in his day – had to fight tooth and nail to draw even close to something like it – and for that, he had admired her.

For years he had attended her, always two steps behind, as though prepared to catch her should she fall; like a young father watching his first child's tottering steps with the eyes of a hawk, arms out, wary with precaution. It had become a steady, comfortable routine, walking her home from school, standing watch as she slept, watching carefully as she played with other children her age – as caring and diligent as no parent could be. The phantom of his presence went unnoticed, yet he was vigilant in his observation and protection.

But for him, it seemed, routine could only ever be a temporary source of serenity. Time passed and children grew, and soon he no longer watched a little girl playing on the swings, but a grown woman working for her own way.

Time, a manipulative creature, changed things. And what was once comfortable was now no less than painful.

His feet touched the pavement of the walkway to the office building, gloved fingers reaching out to slip through the marbled glass window as easily as an oar through water, his body following close behind. His target was slumped over the paper-strewn desk, grayed head resting heavily against the surface, eerily still. Pale hair fluttered gently as the door opened and he lifted his eyes to watch the secretary's face freeze, the color draining to a sickening shade of green as she screamed for someone to call an ambulance. She dragged the man from his chair to administer mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. But she needn't have bothered.

The blurred, gaseous shadow rising from the body was proof that the man was dead. Spirit parted easily from the shell of flesh, but he could not focus on the new soul charged to his guidance.

He didn't want to be there, watching this strange human die. He wanted to be with her, to make sure she got home safely and to spend some time beside her, listening to the beat of her heart and the quiet hum of her voice as she made herself dinner. Yet duty chained him to his task, forcibly turning his eyes to the soul that stood, disoriented and a little frightened, before him.

And duty was not easily set aside.

...

There were times when Lilith wondered about her lack of ability to make good decisions regarding her own welfare. Such as the afternoon in grade school when she had foolishly attempted to play dodge ball with a group of other children at recess, when she had known very well that she was a miserable hand at most sports and had subjected herself to a rather extreme amount of battering from a very solid ball.

And then there had been the incident with the barre a year ago, which had resulted in the breaking of her left leg. Or the time when she had assumed there was no chance of rain, and wound up thoroughly drenched by the time she got home.

It wasn't that she was clumsy or even silly. It was simply that she tried a little too hard to put faith in the positive. Quite often she would have been better off listening to the part of her brain that leaned toward perpetual pessimism. She was also something of a pushover, hence why Sarah managed to bully her into accepting both the party invitation and the date, much to Lilith's dismay.

It was 9:15 when the two girls slid out from Sarah's little red truck to walk the two blocks from the parking lot to the club-slash-cafe where the party was being held. Almost-fashionably-late, as Alice would have said. It was cool outside, relatively warm for a northern October, but Lilith shivered and tugged despairingly at the much too short skirt of her blue and white checkered dress.

"This is ridiculous," she groused at her friend, pushing the little wicker basket she carried further up her arm, "I can't believe I let you talk me into something so stupid."

"Oh shush," Sarah admonished cheerfully, adjusting the ruffles of her shamelessly short French Maid uniform. It fit her well, accenting the red of her hair and the brown of her mischievous eyes, highlighting her slim figure and long legs, but Lilith had balked (and was still balking, just a tad more discreetly) at its risqué quality. Lilith pursed her lips and scowled, which earned her a feather-duster to the nose. "Cheer up! It won't be so bad. Besides, you look so _cute!"_

With an expression reminiscent of someone being sent to the gallows, Lilith stood dejectedly still while Sarah fussed at her costume; the knee-length jumper-dress and thin white peasant shirt needing adjusting, her white stockings needing smoothing, her glittery red shoes needing a bit of a shine, and her braided pigtails needing to be tugged at least once. She was less than pleased with her getup but she quite preferred Dorothy of Oz to Annette, the Queen of Sluts. At least she got a little plush terrier to keep her company in her basket.

Sarah steered her through the glass-paned front door, all smiles and joy. A lover of parties and activity, it didn't take her long to spot someone she just _had_ to talk to. Leaving Lilith to sulk in an empty corner probably reserved for wallflowers like her.

Lilith shied from conversation and people as though they were the plague, watching Sarah's vibrant hair bob back and forth from afar until she thought she would die of discomfort. There was so much noise and hubbub, that of crowds, which she loathed. She wrapped her arms around her own torso and distracted herself by imagining what it might be like to be a chameleon, able to melt into the background and disappear. It would be a handy thing to have, that power of camouflage. Wistfully, she longed for home and the comforts of her own music and her own clothes far away from this mingling mass of strangers.

This wasn't Halloween. Her celebration of this holiday included curling up in her living room after making a huge batch of chocolate-chip pumpkin bread, watching _The Nightmare Before Christmas_ and answering the door to hand out Hershey bars to the children of the apartment complex. What it did _not_ include was traipsing around in a building full of costumed adults acting more irresponsibly than teenagers. Quite honestly, she felt cheated out of one of her favorite holidays.

Just when she was considering hailing a cab and leaving, Sarah returned. The two boys being dragged along were both dressed as pirates in vibrant, raggedy shirts and slacks with wide, colorful sashes; smiling and cracking genial jokes about being pushed around by a girl. The one with a faux eye-patch was Paul, Sarah's boyfriend and the taller of the two. That meant the shorter one was her blind date.

She eyed him warily; attempting a small smile for the sake of being polite and was surprised when he returned it in full, his expression slightly bashful as well as he rubbed the back of his head. He was one of the mildly good-looking types, she noticed. The kind that was easy on eyes without vain or wistful tastes, with hair the shade of brown that couldn't quite decide if it really wanted to be blond or not and dark, dark brown eyes.

"—he's a UW Sophomore, and such a nice guy," Sarah was telling her, and her green eyes journeyed to her friend to watch the redhead taking Paul's arm and take a step backward. Lilith felt a cold anxiety shiver in her veins and she shot the other girl a wide-eyed request to stay. Sarah merely smiled. "Don't worry; I'll be here if you need me. Just give him a chance, ok?" she whispered, squeezing Lilith's shoulders in a swift hug before flouncing off with her boy, leaving Lilith with company she had neither wanted nor asked for.

She glanced at him, a sidelong look that was as suspicious as it was curious, which she tried to hide behind her bangs. He looked a bit ruffled, as though he had been coerced into this just as unfairly as she had. When he looked at her, his smile was accompanied by a nervous laugh and a mild, "well, this is awkward." He held out his hand and introduced, "hi, I'm Kevin Dougherty."

When all she did in response was stare down at his hand with a light similar to panic in her eyes, he withdrew it and cleared his throat. "Sorry about this—when Paul mentioned Sarah was bringing a friend, I didn't know they'd be dragging you kicking and screaming. If I'd known, I would've just told them to forget it."

He did look sorry, she thought, and a little sheepish, which was good. At least he seemed to have some humility. With a silent sigh, she gave in, deciding it would be better for everyone if she at least tried to be social. It would save her from the lecture Sarah was sure to treat her to if she didn't, anyway. "Lilith Gandion," she said, though she wasn't very pleased with the delicate edge to her voice as she gave her name.

"That's French, isn't it?" He asked, leaning against the wall of her chosen corner and looking at her with faint interest in his dark eyes.

"Mhm."

"It's pretty—I like it."

A half-hearted smile was all she offered by way of a thank you. She fidgeted, toying with her basket and glancing around the room to avoid paying too much attention to him, and thereby seeming interested. In truth, all her attention was pinned to him. He didn't seem anything but kind, yet she was completely on her guard, determined not to let him catch her unawares. She wasn't sure what she was afraid of, but that was nothing new, and Lilith had found ways to be content with keeping her distance unless forced into a situation where it was impossible. Like this one.

"You go to the UW," she confirmed quietly, trying to start up some kind of conversation that would ease the uncomfortable silence that had stretched between them both, "what kind of classes are you taking?"

"I'm majoring in business," Kevin answered, sounding relieved that she had chosen such a safe topic. "Mathematics and numbers and all that fun stuff, I just started my AP trigonometry class last week and it's my favorite two hours of the day!" Upon seeing Lilith's exaggerated grimace, he asked, "what?"

She flushed, somewhat embarrassed, and answered, "I hate math."

His smile was amused. "Really?"

"Really," she nodded, "anything beyond geometry and I get headaches."

"Well, what do you like? Music? Art?"

"English."

"Ah, a literature girl, huh?" She gave him a blank look and he held up his hands, palms flat and defensive. "Hey, that's cool. If I couldn't understand it, at least someone can, right?"

She answered with a shrug, no longer feeling remotely talkative and longing for the clock's hands to turn make it midnight so she could go home. But after a moment worthy of a good, loud cricket-chirp passed, a new song started up from the speakers by the DJ's podium, Kevin gestured to the mire of people and asked, "want to dance?"

Lilith balked and shook her head. "Um…I'm not really much of a—"

Ignoring her muttered protests, he lifted the basket from her arm and set it down underneath a table offering punch and bottled water, took her by the arms and pulled her forward through the throngs of people and out into the dance floor.

Spotted with orange light, the dancers were dotted with the reeling figures of men and women, early or lightweight drunks already spreading the stench of sourness through the room. She tried to back away, but Kevin gathered a firm grip high around her waist and led her into the steady, slightly shaky steps of what could have been a waltz with more practice and effort.

"Come on," he soothed, shooting her a pleading smile, "Just one?"

Though she had thoughts of retreating to her corner of secluded safety, Lilith reconsidered, mainly for the choice words that would come from Sarah if she did. But it was only one dance. Kevin hadn't given her any reason to regard him with anything less than civil nicety. Resigning herself to the uneducated dance of public regard, she forced herself to relax and let him lead her in a casual whirl or two…completely oblivious to the pair of eyes that bore into her from across the room, clouded with protective urge and injured pride.

...

He watched her intently from across the crowded room, his eyes narrowed, glittering with dangerous, unseen warning. The mortal boy was too close…_much_ too close to her. Close enough to make it impossible for him to look at her without seeing her far too sweetly smiling chaperone tailing around with her like some hopeful leech.

After years upon years of observing and interacting with people, learning to read the expressions hidden behind the face and shining within the eyes, he could see what the boy was thinking. He knew what the boy wanted. He saw the greed and the indifference he hid (though very well, the observer admitted grudgingly) from the girl he was so consumed with trying to win over.

The poor girl…she wouldn't know what was happening until it was too late. She was already starting to cave to his simple charm, she offered up a smile edged with shyness, but it was a willing and unforced one. It was a tale older than the city's veteran streets. She was too inexperienced to see the crafty falseness to her partner; too naïve, too trusting to notice her own danger.

The boy's hands snagged her by the arms, drawing her out into the dance floor crowded with other costumed couples. Lilith didn't seem too entirely happy about it at first; but her bashful irritation melted into awkward acceptance within a few short moments, and she allowed her companion to lead her in an easy half-waltz.

A low, furious growl threatened to spill from his throat when he saw the mortal boy's hands taking hold of her slender hips.

Quickly he turned away, trying to focus on something else…_anything_ else. He had told himself that he wouldn't interfere with her chance at happiness. This was what he had wanted, wasn't it; for her to find someone so he could let her go? So he could free her from his constant chaperoning. But fits of emotions such as these were still difficult to handle yet, and jealousy was such a _strong_ one.

Flatly ignoring the attentions of small group of young men seated at the table closest to him while he passed, he accepted a glass of punch offered to him by the woman in charge of the refreshment counter, her cat costume hopelessly comical to something such as he.

Closing his eyes, he downed the orangey-pink liquid in a single swallow. The liquid burned down his throat despite the fact that it was merely mortal-made and only barely laced with alcohol. His entire being seemed to smolder with the fires of envy. His borrowed body was restless with the mixture of want and worry that ate at him like an acidic parasite clinging to his insides. Normally he was partial to the soft spirits of the mortal realm, but now the bittersweet alcohol tasted of vinegar.

Turning from the counter, he made his way along the edge of the room, back the way he had come, looking for a space of wall where he could watch more easily. He prowled like a hunger-stricken predator, attention honed directly to the prey stubbornly eluding him, fingers clenching and unclenching in regular intervals as he tried to keep a solid grip upon his better judgment. He knew very well that casting a rage-driven killing curse in a room full of oblivious humans enjoying a party was not in his best interest, regardless of what his temper was screaming for him to do.

Looking determinedly away from the hand that cupped Lilith's chin, lifting her face for the boy to see her eyes more clearly, his lip curled. He could feel those fame filthy hands wrapped around his heart, squeezing cruelly, and with it a cold, gripping want to tear the arms clean from the human's shoulders. Anger swelled to fill the pit of his stomach until he felt certain it would poison him if he let it stay any longer.

She didn't belong here in this jungle of dark-intent and mislaid propriety. She didn't deserve to be used for her pretty looks and her sweet demeanor like this cad was so clearly plotting. But then again, she didn't deserve to be trailed all her life by a man she couldn't see, either; watching her from beyond the range of her sight and understanding.

Guilt plagued him for that, the knowledge of how she might have reacted had she known the truth, the very real prediction of fear he could almost taste on the sweat-and-rum coated air. It was the guilt which solidified his decision to let her be, and he backed away.

One final glance back toward the dance floor sent his anger rushing back to him and he just barely managed to bite back a guttural snarl before it sounded in a gut reaction to seeing his ward of nearly nineteen years in the arms of another man. Terrible with fury, his eyes were darkened slits as he stepped out from the shadowy corner. But his rage, rationality told him, couldn't be acted upon, and suffering supposedly brought peace in its wake – a peace he already knew he would never know.

Suddenly the room was stifling, choking him under the pressures of fact, reason, longing and hopelessness. Pulling the knit hat from his head and tossing it aside, he wound his way back toward the door which would lead him out and away from the convoluted swarm of humans, flatly overlooking the glances and whispers of a gang of young men dressed as football players of the American variety.

Though he tried not to allow his sullen mood to show, he found it difficult to reign in the temper blazing like mercury within his aura. It was obvious that Lilith had found someone; there was no further need for him to serve as her unwanted chaperone. He could tell the child was an ill-meaning brattling and not a good choice for Lilith, knew he would regret leaving her alone with the human boy. However, sore emotions and a hurting heart left him little choice but to find space – or he really _would_ do something regrettable.

Dark-shadowed eyes to the throng of lively, chattering partiers waiting for admittance from the bouncers, he stepped out from the sweaty club and into the night; turning his back to the girl he still felt should be left no more than ten feet away from his watchful guardianship. The black trails of makeup that cut jagged slices into the skin at eyelid and cheekbone struck a stark contrast against the pallor of his complexion. It granted him the likeness of someone who might fit in with the venue all the while flaring lights and the pound of synthetic beats passed over him like a disapproving sneer.

As he crossed the threshold, avoiding the eager eyes of a woman standing in the line, and the mouth parted as though she was about to speak to him, he shed the slouching gait and awkward countenance of his disguise. Passing into the shadows of city night, he ignored the steady observance of the bouncers and of the curiously appraising line of costumed people, not wanting to be there any longer than he had to.

The path he took was not unknown to him, trailing along the streets leading to the back-allies that coded the slums. For the third time in just as many days he let his feet walk where they would, haunting the darkness of his own fears and desires, knowing nothing but miserable uncertainty, anxiety and despair. He walked like a man robbed of the will to do anything but study the earth.

A painted ghost, he wandered along the twisted lanes of brick and mortar with no heed to where he was going or why. There was no need to know, and he wasn't entirely certain he could bear to examine why.

His breath clouded with the mist of the autumn chill, a white vapor that faded within seconds as he passed. It was just like him. Mist was all he could be in her life; an illusion, a whisper on the wind to warn her of danger as any good dog could have done. He looked up, eyes paling drastically as he watched the sky, though there was little to see on such a smog-blanketed canvas of black.

Broken glass of a window, one that had been busted clean open by some passing deviant or long-since ended quarrel, scraped the base of his palm. Shards of translucent material rained the ground beneath his feet, a shallow glitter of cruel beauty that cut like a knife, but never as badly or as deeply as unspoken rejection. Blood flowed scarlet and rich, the cut long, shallow and sweet with pain. He glanced down at it, the marring crevice in his hand, staining his flesh like a blooming red flower of color, feeling and lifelessness.

White fingers folded closed upon the uneven line. His hand clenched, crushing the wound and relishing the sting of pain, the drip of the blood down his forearm as it fell to the dirty ground beneath his feet; twining, singing rivulets of energy.

"Save me."

The whisper, so quiet that no passing person could have heard, was blank and toneless. More of him was injured than just the slashed palm. It was an injury that ran so deep, no probing hands could touch it and no voice, no matter how concerned, could reach it. It festered and grew, a bottle of ink tipped and soaking through him, seeping through his soul until everything clear and clean was marred with a sticky black coating…with no one and nothing to stop it.

No, that was not true. A cure existed, but it lived within a human being so fragile and frail that any sign of him would be rejected instantly.

What did one do, when they were shunned by their very nature?


	4. Perpetual Mirage

**Chapter 3  
**Perpetual Mirage

Recommended Listening: "The Fantasy" by 30 Seconds to Mars, "Savin' Me" by Nickelback  
and "Not Strong Enough" by Apocalyptica [feat. Brent Smith of Shinedown]

* * *

The quiet rustle of the pages in her book was the only sound that gave texture to the still air. Otherwise the living room was strewn with silence, stained with the vivid orange of the sunset that bounced off white walls and clashed with yellow light from the floor lamp angled over the squashy armchair. Occasionally the occupant of said chair would shift to rest her narrow elbow against the padded arm or tuck her feet farther between the plush upholstery and her own bottom. But aside from this and the steady fading of the color in the sky from scarlet to deep, twilit blue, nothing else moved.

There was nothing but the pages, the slim fingers which turned them and the green eyes following the printed words with subtle ardor and peaceful enjoyment.

She couldn't see him standing just behind her, forearms braced against the back of her chosen perch and leaning over her shoulder. He was invisible to human eyes, but he read along with her, his eyes flashing across the words with a speed worthy of newborn lightning, fingertips smoothing over the cushion each time she turned the page, copying the movement as though it was his mimicking which made it possible for her to move.

Sometimes, when he would finish a page before she did, his eyes would stray to her face in order to better examine the soft expression of joy that smoothed itself upon her cheeks. She would visibly smile when she came across a phrase of scene she especially liked, even laugh when she read something amusing, which would spark a flare of peaceful affection somewhere inside his chest.

He would watch her fingers bestow gentle, lingering caresses of affection to the dry, unresponsive paper, as she read, as she turned the pages. He would fight brutally with the sadness that gnawed at him like a terrible thirst; a parched harbored for that touch he couldn't have.

It hurt that she didn't know of his presence, but there was very little he could hope to accomplish by becoming visible to her; because he knew, better than anyone else alive, that she would not welcome him. She was a delicate creature, whether she recognized it or not, and held no tenderness for those such as him, whatever her gentle demeanor belied. He knew that she would probably never see him as anything but a monstrous, unnatural phenomenon. Yet certainty didn't mean there was no hope within him.

If anything was certain, it was the element of change. The bittersweet ritual that passed between them almost every night was just another coat of protective paint over a fragile glass ornament. With each hour it grew thicker and stronger, as did his resolve to help that change along. Surely the pain had to fade sometime?

He already knew the answer, and no matter how many times he tried to reason with it, push it aside, nothing ever helped. Eternity was a great architect of patience, but there was nothing like eons of restlessness to make one understand truth; difficult or otherwise.

This night, three nights removed from the Halloween party, truth told him a tale of a dire mistake. Had it been wise to let her free of his protective shelter, even for those few scant moments? Should he have kept her safely wrapped in the embrace of white wings? No. It would have been unfair to do so. He listened to her converse with the human boy, hearing her bemused (if a bit shy) remarks, and kept his distance in check. Despite the whisper his internal consciousness hell-bent on convincing him to turn right around and snatch her back into safe arms, he couldn't quite bring himself to do so.

It would be so easy to make the boy forget her altogether. Just a flush of power and a tiny twist of will and she would be beyond the reach of her prospective paramour. He had asked himself, over and over, if he was willing to risk everything he had – every stable layer of protective paint – for the sake of mending the mistake, had one been made. Of course he was willing, for the sake of protecting her. Or was the idea of offering protection merely an extension of his own fears masquerading as good intent? He couldn't be sure…and so, he hadn't acted.

The weight of indecision crushed upon his shoulders, biting firmly into the flesh of his neck with teeth and claws blackened with ill-favor and malicious whispers while dragging him steadily deeper into the darkness. _You're a foolish, hopeless wreck,_ it hissed at him, _damaged goods, disease and rot. You will _never_ have enough to offer her. _

And yet…somehow he was always able to push past his own raving self contempt. Stubbornly, desperately, he shoved the little bird-like voice aside, pulling himself back above the surface by his hair. Every time his clouded eyes would find her face, the youthful vitality there which allowed her to give her life everything she had, he would feel the darkness peeling back just enough for him to breathe. Her presence shielded him from the conflicts in his heart.

He craned his head to one side, dissatisfied with the angle of vision he had and finding he no longer had any interest in the book. His steps were silent on the somewhat thin beige carpet, his figure blurred by shields and veils of magic held in place by unhappy self control as he circled the chair to stand before her and gazed down at the young woman curled into the cushions. At perfect ease, she was completely oblivious to the raging gale of hopeless desperation and craving dependency right in front of her. Always with her, always watching over her; whispering her name with a mournful reverence.

That was how it was meant to be – how it was _always_ meant to be. He would watch her and she would never know of his existence. The thought of it burned his heart like the brand of damnation, searing through tender tissue without a sense of mercy and without any sign of relief ahead. But so it always would be, unless she chose to seek him.

Quite suddenly she moved; the stillness broken when, with a sharp snap, her hands brought the covers of the book together. She set it down, stretching her arms over her head and sighing quietly, then got to her feet. Reaching out with a soft hand, she switched off the light before straightening and looking up. Her chin tipped, her face lifted, and for a breathless moment she could have been looking right at him.

He knew very well she was only peering at the clock positioned on the wall behind his back, but as he shifted slightly to stand directly before her it seemed that what she saw was the sharp line of his nose. And if he tilted his head just right…his eyes.

Perhaps it was due to the magical element of infant moonlight, perhaps simply because his shield of control was already slipping from place, but standing there with her in the darkness, it mattered very little. The urge to touch her was so strong that it caused him literal pain, bringing pangs of agony to ripple through his chest as he lifted his hand. His fingers trembled, longing to brush the wisps of brown hair back from her forehead or smooth across the soft slope of her cheek.

Yet he hesitated, knowing that if he touched her, he would be obligated by moral law to become visible as well. Either way, he would risk frightening the poor girl to death. Despite the irony, her death was the very _last_ thing he wanted.

It didn't matter. In another instant the decision was made for him. She turned away with a yawn, heading for the hallway.

Pale fingers curled, hand clenching into a white-knuckled fist while he gritted his teeth and viciously beat back the shredding effect of the pain. With a heartbeat erratic and irregular, he mentally called forth the reserved thread of willpower he needed in order to keep himself from following her those few short meters into her bedroom. It was so difficult, requiring both effort and serious amounts of energy. _Difficult,_ but not impossible.

All the same, it was dangerous to carry on this way. These little indulgences into a world he had no right to intrude in were strains to his sanity. No matter how hard he tried, it was always there with each passing day and worse still every new fall of night, the compulsive desire to be in her company.

It didn't matter how much effort he put into making himself stay away from her; he was unable to be rid of his need to be around the bright glow of peace and rest that she unknowingly lent him. He was an unseen moth, uselessly attracted to her spark of flame. Stubbornly, he darted in as close as he possibly could with the full understanding that each incident brought him ever closer to being scorched to a crisp.

That manner of stress was more than simply damaging; it bordered on the edge of becoming destructive.

Having been blessed with a frank logic when it came to analyzing and diagnosing his own personal matters, he could sense that it was only a matter of time before he snapped. It was only a matter of time before he was too far gone to do anything more than take; and by then it would be too late to bleed out the poison. A mere shell of something good would be left, giving way for something twisted into madness, grasping and soulless and beyond any hope.

He had very little choice left. Yet while he was acutely aware of the fact that allowing the inevitable was unacceptable, he couldn't quite bring himself to make the move that would expose his fragility to the one who could break it with something as slight as a scattering of frightened words. But he had to do something, if for no other reason than to counter the simple fact that he was dying.

...

"How was your Halloween?"

Lilith slid from her coat and jeans, neatly folding the clothes and stacking them next to her dance bag atop the double-decker counter which wrapped around the dressing room. Sometimes it was a bother to have a community center for their classroom, but often the areas such as a kitchen with a refrigerator and public restrooms came in handy; one for holding food and cold drinks, the other for publicity. Hopping up to sit on the upper level of the cheap-laminate countertop, Lilith smiled at the early arrivals from her class and answered Elena's polite post-vacation inquiry.

"It was nice," she said, "my friend's parents were in Chile for the week, so we got together and made cranberry bread and handed out candy." Rolling her standard, pale pink tights down her legs, she folded the open hole (meant for easier access to the toes to apply spacers, band-aids, lamb's wool, and other such tools to make pointe less painful) over her toes. "How about yours?"

Elena rolled her eyes. "My fiancé and I got stuck behind that accident on I-5—the one with the two semis and a cab. We didn't get back home until midnight!" Brianne and Maddy, looking up from comparing their new pairs of shoes, exchanged sympathies with their friend, but Lilith's attention wandered to the open doorway through which their teacher entered, clapping her hands and calling for attention.

"Ok, ladies," Jessica announced, "let's get started on some stretches while we wait for our stragglers."

The girls stowed away bits of clothing and after-work snacks. Shoes and water bottles in hand, they made their way through the hall and into the studio, Lilith scrambling to shuck her sweater and gather her shoes in a timely manner. When she noticed that Jessica hadn't left with the rest of the girls, she turned her green eyes to her dance teacher and apologized, "I'm sorry, it's been a heck of a day."

Jessica's soft, pleasant face contained empathy. "Why? What happened?"

For a woman in her mid-forties, Jessica Derre was really more like a friend, and one that could be even more enthusiastic than some of her students were. She was the best instructor Lilith ever could have hoped for.

Since she had started dancing later on in her young life instead of as a child, and because she only made the money to go to an inexpensive school, her prospects hadn't been good. Yet while Jessica had been a student at some of the best academies in the country, she had decided to start up a little school for girls who wanted to dance but perhaps couldn't afford to get lessons somewhere else. For this she had become something of a legend and a hero among the young student-dancer community of the Seattle-Tacoma area.

"Oh, our wireless internet went haywire and we had to track down five different IT people before someone could patch it up." Lilith shrugged, "just another day in public services. I'll be right in, just have to sew my ribbon back on real quick."

Glancing down at the sewing kit and detached pointe shoe ribbon in the girl's hands, Jessica nodded, but she didn't leave. "I actually wanted to talk to you before we start class."

Lilith lent her full attention to her teacher's words, setting her scuffed and well broken-in shoes aside.

"I was having coffee with John Simmons—he's the instructor at the boys dance academy on Vashon—and we wound up talking about how much more versatile and enigmatic co-ed productions are, and we decided to do a collaborated show this year."

"That's not all that new, is it?" Lilith asked, and the question felt rather lame to her own ears. The ballet school had brought students from Simmons' academy before, for duets, ensembles, and the like.

But Jessica shook her head and explained, "this time it is. We chose to put together a complete collaborative project, the whole of both schools interacting together for individual and paired pieces."

It was very like Jessica to want to try something new, and to seize the opportunity to do so when presented it. But Lilith didn't understand why she was being told specifically. Surely she wasn't the only student to have missed the previous week; after all, Alice missed class much more often than Lilith because of work. As she awaited the impending reason for the little pre-class huddle, Jessica sent her a smile that somehow managed to be less than encouraging regardless of the warmth to it.

"I'm giving you one of the soloist positions for the year," her teacher said, "to showcase how far you've come since you started with us."

Lilith stared, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment when she heard the news. A solo? There was no way she was ready for that kind of attention; granted, she was part of the senior class, but she still had a long way to go until she was as accomplished as some of the other girls. Didn't she? "I didn't think I was good enough for a solo..."

"But you are" Jessica argued, visibly surprised. "You're the best in modern and the piece I have in mind for you is very modern in style. You have just the right concept of grounding and usage of space, and besides, I think it's about time your dedication to the school is recognized."

Lilith was only really half listening. Presently she was taking out the fraying stitches from where the ribbon on her shoe had once been, picking at the thread with nervous fingers as she contemplated getting out in front of an audience and having to dance for them all by herself. She loved dancing, loved performing, but a solo just seemed daunting. She was seriously considering telling Jessica it would be better if someone else had the honor. And she would have, if not for something Jessica added.

"Actually—now that I think about it, it's more of a duet then a solo…" Lilith treated herself to a silent sigh of relief. Having one of the other girls with her would be much more comfortable. "For the lifts and everything, and for the overall theme, I've partnered you with one of the boys from John's school."

"_What?"_ Lilith's voice rose to the level of heightened alarm. There was a soft clunk of impact when she dropped her shoe to the floor; the stiffened layers of material striking the tiled kitchen floor, accentuated by the soft flutter of pink satin ribbon as it slid from her fingers. Her green eyes were anxious with shock.

Of course, Jessica meant traditional partnering – the kind that featured a woman as the light, beautiful ballerina and a man as her stepping-stone, supporting and displaying her grace to whoever might see. Modern dance was different as far as technique went, but Lilith could already tell what kind of contact she would be supposed to have with the stranger fated to be shoved at her. The program's theme was based on the cultural meaning and celebration of love. That did not inspire much hope for a mere congenial shaking of hands and exchanging false smiles.

Jessica looked startled by the vehement reaction. With raised eyebrows and an expression clearly akin to concern, she asked, "What's wrong? I know you've never danced with a partner before, but I'll make sure you know exactly what you're doing."

"It's not that." Lilith slid from the counter to rest both feet on the floor, slippery in tights, and picked up her shoe. Awkward with her own thoughts and assumptions, she fingered the worn-down satin at the end of the toe box, tracing its squared edge and trying to come up with a way to explain something she didn't really want to talk about. "It's just, I'm not—I'm not good with…" In the end, her voice simply faded into the envelope of silence, hoping the other female would understand.

"Oh, I see," Jessica's tone was gentle. "I know how you feel…I was a wreck when I had my first partner. I was _en pointe;_ he was two inches shorter _and_ dropped me," she grimaced, clearly recalling the unhappy scene. "I'll _never_ forget that show for as long as I live. But don't worry!" The gleam in the woman's blue eyes was nothing short of victorious. "I found you the perfect partner."

Lilith eyed her teacher with something not far from suspicion. Jessica was infamous for organizing odd matches when it came to groups and partnering; so infamous, in fact, that it had turned her into a running legend in the east coast dance community. Wary that she might be doomed to end up in an awkward position, and quite possibly with a partner with as much knowledge and experience as she did: namely none.

"Oh?" Was her only response, pushing for more information regarding her to-be partner, and pretending that Jessica had correctly guessed the source of her discomfort, when in reality she had missed it altogether.

"He's a visitor to John's school. Apparently he does a lot of traveling—actually attended _Bolshoi_ for a couple years, if you can believe it." Lilith's eyes widened at the mention of the famous Russian Ballet company. "He's _very_ good. I watched one of their classes the week before last and saw he has a nice, solid ground for modern lifts and bends. From what I've observed, he'll be an excellent compliment to you."

Her face fell. So he was experienced – _very_ experienced. If anything, that made things worse; now she was downright destined to make an absolute fool out of her _in_experienced self. She believed in destiny about as much as she believed in the Easter Bunny, but she was certain about that.

Jessica caught sight of the dour look on her student's face and tilted her head to one side. "He's cute," she noted with a wink. "Tall, too. And I can guarantee he won't drop you on your head, so don't think of giving me any excuses." When Lilith said nothing, Jessica reached out and laid a hand on her shoulder, offering a warm, familiar source of comfort and reassurance. "It'll be fine. I promise."

Knowing there was no real sense in arguing about it, Lilith gave her teacher a smile and a nod. "Sure," she agreed; and with that, Jessica patted her shoulder, hopped down from the counter and trotted off to the classroom, leaving a very disheartened Lilith alone in the dressing room.

It wasn't that she resented the idea of being a part of the dance, because she didn't. Truly, she was rather flattered that Jessica wanted her for the role, and she wouldn't even mind the duet part, even with this young man who had studied with the world renowned Bolshoi company, had it been a casual partnership. It was the simple fact that the traditional focus and the potentially-suggestive theme implied a good deal of physical contact. While it was beautiful to watch a male dancer lifting a ballerina as though she weighed nothing at all, Lilith did _not_ particularly favor the idea of some strange man's hands all over her body.

Just what she needed – another headache.

But she decided there was no point in moping, and decided to do so later, since she wanted to enjoy her last normal class before the hectic, joyful chaos of choreography season. So, deliberately not thinking about her would-be-partner, she gathered up her shoes and bag of lamb's wool, and padded into the studio to join her class.

...

Lilith's mood had not improved much by the end of the two-hour session. It had actually seemed to sour even more, and the door to the studio closed behind her with a snap that was just a tad harsher than she had intended. Throwing her bag over shoulder and heading down the sidewalk in the vague direction of her apartment, she tried to swallow the annoyed anxiety bubbling like hot tar in her veins. Janelle had been absent, still in Chicago for a competition, and Alice had been absent due to work; leaving her no one to vent to. And she had a deep-set need to vent.

While the girls had swapped their pointe shoes for their leather warm-up slippers for their modern session, Jessica had settled her chair in front of them and gave the senior girls a second run-down of the show.

Based on timeless, ageless cultural celebration, a tribute to romance and mythology and good things; the instructors had chosen to assemble a performance with four acts, one devoted to an area of the world with a rich, widely recognizable group of cultures. They would be performing love stories, from famous tales such as Eros and Psyche, Tristan and Isolde, to many more that were no more than interpretations of culture and symbolism used to tell their own, new stories. Too many to be recalled right away.

The long and short of it all; Jessica had read out the tentative list of ensembles that included the seniors, let them listen to their music, and started them on some step patterns for their class piece. They would be working on partnering and choreographing other pieces later on, but the dismissal did little to dissuade Lilith's dread.

The more time that passed, the more she thought about how very unhappy she was about the prospect of being partnered with a student of Simmons'. She had never been able to warm up around men, socially or even casual-physically at work, which was no real secret. Maybe it was her daddy's fault that whenever she saw a man – especially one past his early thirties – she wanted to make herself small and insignificant enough to go unseen. Or maybe she simply didn't like them. But at the same time, she would have hardly called her dislike of close contact to be anything more than a quirk, and it wasn't as though it affected her at work or in public.

It was true; she had agreed to grab lunch with Kevin on Saturday, but the venture out of her shell was really no more than what manners dictated polite when your best friend begged you to give her boyfriend's buddy a "chance". She wasn't sure how she felt about the guy just yet. He was nice, always on his best behavior, but she couldn't seem to get comfortable. But it was entirely possible she was a late bloomer and the whole thing required more patience.

That didn't mean she had any desire to be touched or kept in a close vicinity with some stranger even if he _was_ a fellow dancer. The thought made her want to hide in a corner and refuse to come out, which, of course, she wouldn't. It was silly to go that far to avoid something distasteful.

There were more reasonable ways around a problem.

Ultimately, she would have to explain to Jessica that she just wasn't right for the role. She didn't _have_ to say it was because her manner was irrationally and freakishly similar to a skittish cat when it came to boys; just that she wasn't comfortable working with one. It might work. She just hoped it would work on headstrong Jessica and her new protégé, whoever he was.

She had just reached the crosswalk directly across the street from her apartment complex, the junction of Sixth and Cherry. When she automatically stopped for a few seconds to check for traffic, the light telling pedestrians it was safe to cross clicked from red to white, signaling her forward. Thinking her path was clear she fished the keys from her jeans pocket and proceeded ahead.

But almost the very second she stepped out into the road, the squealing of metal break gears and the putrid smell of searing rubber consumed all else. She knew that sound. It was the city's variation on a wolf pack's howling theme, with her cast as the available deer.

Lilith froze, panic seizing her brain in an iron fist and rendering her muscles useless and unable to scramble out of the way of what would certainly be her death. There was but one lucid thought in her mind as she watched the sedan's high-beams growing steadily larger; one thought that was strangely calm, a hope that dying wouldn't hurt too much, because she wasn't too high on the pain-tolerance scale. Regret was a slick coating upon her tongue, bitter and foul. There had been so many things she had wanted to do – could have done. She would never get a chance to do any of it now...

Something had a grip at her stomach, hard, unyielding, something that lurched backward with the strength of what felt like an iron bar and forced her back onto the sidewalk, scraping at her heels when her legs were too shaky with shock to step up. A swift rush of frosty air buffeted her face when the car sped by, an angry shout flying from its hurried driver.

She was still alive. But how?

Equilibrium ruptured by the blow to her balance, she flailed, sending her keys flying from loose fingers as she fought to right herself. The dancer in her knew, however, that balance was too far from her grasp to prevent her back from smacking into the cement, and she braced herself for impact by throwing her arms out in the hopes it might prevent any serious spinal injury.

Yet instead of crashing to the ground, she was caught mid-fall. The steely band which had pulled her from the car's path grabbed her firmly about the waist to save her from the certainty of bruising at the hands of the sidewalk (figuratively speaking, of course).

Her head jerked backward, eyes grown wide, just in time to see a vibrant flash of violet and black when a gloved hand snapped out to seize her thrown keys right from the air. The protective force's eerie purple eyes moved to her face, the color so rich and radiant that it was almost jewel-toned, shaded by a veil of hair so pale that the blond strands were very nearly white.

Wide-eyed and frightened from her near-death as she was, there was no mistaking that the assistance came from a man, a strange and startling kind of man who held her like she was no more than a feather pillow, and that was enough to add one extra panicked thump to her heart. And yet, as she looked at him, wordless and stiff, she calmed. Something about the way he regarded her with an even, unusually clear gaze, made it impossible to be afraid.

He was tall, most of a head taller than she, and dressed in a pair of faded monotone jeans, a black hooded sweatshirt and a jacket of a strange, glossy black material which was slick to the touch. The hood was drawn up, but she could still see wisps of edgily layered hair that framed a pale, striking face. His cheeks and chin were smooth, leading the eyes to a gently angled jaw, high, carved cheekbones and a sharp, straight nose.

It was his mouth that caught and held her, though, when it curved into a smile as soft and luxurious as cream when he noticed that she was staring at him. In combination with the violet of his eyes – true violet, not the shade of blue Victorians described in way that made it seem more exotic – that smile drew her in like a magnet.

There was something about him…something not quite right, not quite real. She felt a strong urge to reach out and touch him to make sure she wasn't imagining things. Yet when his lips parted, her throat constricted, lodged tight with awe, as he formed words with the most beautiful voice to ever have made contact with her ears.

"I believe these are yours," he said softly, and it was so utterly soothing in tone that it was almost a kind of melody, lilting and light. The accent seemed a little odd, but she hardly noticed it singularly. She looked down amidst her distraction to see him hold out her keys – dull silver against the smooth black leather of gloves which coated his long hands like protective layer of extra skin.

She could neither move nor speak with a stiff body and frozen tongue, shock and bewilderment allowing none but the lift of her gaze from keys to purple eyes. The reality that she had remained half-balanced in the grip of a stranger didn't register. In fact, she really didn't have any space in her mind for anything but the relief of being alive, in one piece, and unshakably calm.

His smile seemed to soften (apparently he understood her inability to do anything except gape like a suffocated fish), and he set her back on her feet. While he made certain she was steady before letting her stand on her own, his arms lingered, as though he couldn't quite muster whatever it would take to withdraw completely. The leather of his glove was soft, as supple as butter when he took hold of her hand and pressed the keys into her palm; the metal cold against her skin as her fingers curled around them.

"Please try to be careful. These streets are not kind and it would be a shame to mark them with death."

With a courtly nod, a gesture that seemed both strange and oddly familiar, he turned away, his hand sliding from hers with another brush of soft, well-worn leather. And yet his eyes strayed, lingered upon her face, light as a butterfly's breath, soft and downy as the graze of a bird's wing. Time blurred, blended with the light and flaring colors that swam around her. The sight of him leaving struck her with a wave of emotion so powerful that it probably could have knocked her over had it been a physical thing. Terror clashed with hope, a sense of loss, and that ever evocative feeling of recognition she didn't understand.

When he looked away, she was released from the captivating power of his eyes and the flickering shock of his touch. Catching back her wits and her breath in an instant, she whirled; slightly unsteady on cold and shaky feet, her green eyes picked the glossy fabric of his retreating back out from the rest of the sidewalk traffic.

"Thank you!"

Though her voice had been barely more than a hoarse whisper, somehow he heard it. Pausing to glance at her over one straight shoulder, he shot her a smile that was, quite simply, the most dazzling thing she had ever seen – all soft, pale lips and brilliant eyes. His reply of, "my pleasure," was a whisper of satin against her ears. And then he simply melted into the swarming crowd of the after-work rush; masked with a shift of hurried bodies to conceal him.

She didn't know how long she lingered there after he had gone, her eyes fixed to the spot where he had last been visible. Her head felt fuzzy, light with contents akin to helium and stuck in place as though pinned to the spot by the purple of eyes no longer within the nearby proximity. Only when a harried-looking woman bumped her shoulder while passing, mumbling a coarse apology, did she shake out of her mindless, frozen trance.

Rushing to cross when the pedestrian light turned white (making doubly sure it was her turn this time), fingers tightly closed around her keys, she fled for her apartment, racing up the stairs with the enthusiasm of the deranged. As the door shut securely behind her, she leaned back against it, shoulders and back pressed to the fortified wood while letting loose a shaky sigh.

She noticed that her lungs felt cramped, as though she had just run a marathon and was short of breath. There was no need to examine why, but her cheeks flushed with embarrassment all the same.

His face was little more than the imprinted, slightly faded copy of one of Michelangelo's masterpieces in her memory, thanks to the combination of shock and recovery, and the overall brief nature of the encounter. She could remember he'd been lovely, could remember that his eyes had held her fast as a hypnotist's watch. But the details had lapsed into what was now most definitely nothing but a glorified interpretation based on hormones and chemical reactions, all but the race of her heartbeat and the color purple.

That was the only detail she could remember; the way he had looked at her and smiled at her…in a way she still didn't know how to define.

Her hand was still tingling. As a matter of fact, so was her lower back, and everywhere else he had touched her – intentionally or un. Her heart _still_ beat like thunder beneath her ribs, breath coming hard from lungs that hurt because of it, and her memory fixed upon the glory of that lovely smile she couldn't seem to shake from her mind's eye.

A tiny stirring of excitement fluttered against her insides like a tiny butterfly; a rushing thrill from not only cheating death, but having been saved so spectacularly. Immediately she recognized it for the puppy-love of infatuation from the positive attention, which was a result of more chemicals. Her brain, on the other hand, was sharply reminding her that assistance aside, she could easily have been mugged or perhaps knifed by the same young man _despite_ his pretty smile. Looks were a guarantee of nothing.

Like a balloon pierced by a pin, her exhilaration deflated. She was being stupid…losing her good sense to the kind of frivolity she would expect from Sarah or Alice, not herself. There were women who had been married to their husbands for years and suddenly the man decided to beat her until she was barely alive for the smallest, most obscure reasons. Why would some strangely-dressed boy on the street be trustworthy just because he had been well-mannered at the time?

Besides, should she even be looking at another man when she was already sort of involved with Kevin? Not that she expected to keep seeing him, since she was starting to suspect that their goals for the relationship were not quite compatible, but that wasn't the point. Propriety was important.

She glared at the wall across from her and hefted her bag onto the bench there, under which she kept her shoes. Who cared if he'd been pretty? The good-looking ones always seemed to be the first to go sour. Look at her own father; handsome as could be and he turned out to be unstable and a mean drunk.

In any case, the chances of running into the man with the purple eyes again were slim to none in a city as large as this one. Yet she bolted the door twice behind her before heading off to grab some dinner, a shower and some sleep. One could never be too careful; and something about the day she'd just had made her inner alarms tingle with precaution.

...

"Damn it," the words hissed through his teeth, slipping between his lips like a tiny, invisible snake, writhing with frustration. "Damn, damn, _damn_."

He took the sharp left down an alley steeped in the shadows of oncoming twilight, the heels of his boots clicking against the sidewalk, the rhythm one of anger upon the silence. The leather of his gloves stretched easily across his knuckles as his hands clenched inside jacket pockets, fingers curling into palms that itched with the sparks of emotion. "You are an idiot, _ang'la_," the mutter was terse and irritable, composed of an aggravation that tinted an otherwise pleasant tone. "You should not have let her see your face."

His furious steps slowed before stopping altogether; pale lavender eyes flickering upward to look at the darkening sky, then swept downwards to examine the alley he had entered, gathering his bearings before heading off down another left turn that opened onto a cramped and bustling street.

The slums of Seattle were a place to be wary; drug dealers, prostitutes, and those just looking for trouble lined every wall, clustered around every corner. Places like these could be hazardous, and all too many a human had met their (occasionally untimely) end down crooked ways such as these. But _he_ had nothing to fear here. He passed through the narrow street without pause, headed straight for the building he knew like the back of his hand.

Thoughts divided, he let them linger momentarily upon the recollection of a young woman's awed, slightly dazed face, his mutter halved with relief and trepidation. "At the very least, you avoided coming to an early demise," a sigh, "be _careful_. I cannot _always_ be there…"

A right turn this time, straight through a sloppily painted door over which was secured an eerily flickering neon sign reading _Macabre Hall._ Down the stairs lit by a single, guttering oil lamp, through the open archway and into a room bathed with a deep blue flood light; he strode right up to the thick chain strewn across the entrance and gazed steadily at the thick-set bouncer that stood on the other side, waiting.

The guard held a stack of cards in his hand, from which he drew one and held it up blank-side to the visitor.

"Queen of Water," the newcomer murmured in answer to the unspoken question.

Slipping the card back into his deck, the guard reached down to unhooked the chain and allowed him passage. "His Highness is in his office."

"Perfect."


	5. Candy Perfume Boy

**Chapter 6  
**Candy Perfume Boy

Recommended Listening: "Get Another Boyfriend" by The Backstreet Boys

* * *

"What's the matter, Pigeon?"

The warm hand closing over the top of hers startled her out of the daydream, banishing the pictures clouding her consciousness. Her head snapped upright from the position with chin cradled in her palm, eyes clearing in an instant to settle on the blithely inquisitive face peering at her from across the table. Kevin's question hung in the air, quickly becoming awkward while she floundered for some kind of excuse for the excessive amount of spacing out she had been doing lately. She felt guilty. They were supposed to be on a date, after all, and thinking about someone else when in such a position was a bad thing, wasn't it?

The first time she had caught herself imagining what it might be like to happen upon the purple-eyed boy again she had put it down to a case of minor curiosity, most likely derived from some miniscule remnant of shock. But the day after, then the day after that, and even the next two days after that she had come to realize that it was more than simple curiosity. The intrigue was nestled too deeply to deserve such a small label, as was the seriousness of her despair when she had come to find that her ability to remember the touch of his gloved fingers against the skin of her hand. A memory that was just as clear as it had been seconds after his disappearance.

Lilith was not one to leap in fright of every little shadow or scrape of wind-bustled tree branches to her window, but she was anxious-natured enough to deem this little detail to be unnatural and unwanted. She wanted nothing to do with the strange, eerie-eyed man and his powerful grip, nor his pretty face. Men like that – men like her father – were nothing but trouble, heartbreak and ruin. Handsome, sweetly-smiling and alluring they might be, but they weren't worth the plague of negative potential they always brought.

If this was true, then why was she still halfheartedly hoping she might stumble across him one day? She should have been happy as she was, in her perfect balance of solitude and friendly company with her girls. She even had Kevin to fill the place of a romantic relationship.

Yet, was that_really_ what she wanted?

At first he had charmed her with a kindly awkward, easygoing demeanor, and, in all honesty, Lilith had been surprisingly comfortable around him. After a week, however, something appeared to have changed. No longer was he acting like a sweet, gangling college boy, but a bit of a bother and something of a control-freak.

Wherever she went, he wanted to know about it, whatever she did, he wanted to hear about it. He pressed her to go out nearly every night and when he took her home afterwards, he almost had to be bullied into leaving. Then he had taken to calling her _Pigeon_, which wasn't exactly demeaning as it was overly possessive for the amount of time she had known him, according to her standards.

Yet none of that was as bad as how oddly disturbed she felt when he had tried to kiss her the day before yesterday. She had panicked and turned her cheek to him the first time, a few days earlier, but he had gotten her mouth the second time; and while not necessarily horrible, the brief peck had made her more than a little wary of him and his deliberate deafness where her mumbled protests were concerned.

Feeling pressured, doubtful, and a little frustrated, she had pushed it and pushed it aside, until she had come to the point where – lips tingling with pressure and brain shrieking with a paranoid squeal of distress – she had to think it through.

According to both Sarah's, Alice's, and Janelle's varying but simultaneous reports to her about dating and love and other such nonsense, she was under the serious impression that she and Kevin were not compatible. She needed her space and independence, but Kevin was clingy, needing constant reminders that she was paying attention to him. If Lilith had ever imagined herself married or in a relationship (occurrences few in number, but everyone wondered occasionally), her partner had been reliable, understanding, soft-spoken, and willing to let her be in control.

She could not exist without control. Its value had been imprinted into her, branded into the deepest parts of her mind, weighed as preciously as gold for the lack of it she had suffered for so long in her childhood.

The conclusion was still shaky. She knew she needed some serious confirmation from Sarah, at least, before deciding for sure, but she was seriously considering breaking her ties to this boy. The lopsided relationship were starting to put a strain on her; besides, she had vowed never to end up detesting her own home again – _especially_ not because of some needy man who wouldn't leave her alone.

She put on a smile, but couldn't quite banish the tired edge which lingered at the corner of her mouth when she did so. "I'm sorry," she answered quietly, "nothing's wrong, I'm just tired. Today was kind of stressful." Which was certainly true, but had nothing to do with work.

Setting down his fork, Kevin pushed back from the table and picked up the little slip of white paper the waitress had left for them almost twenty minutes earlier. "Want me to take you home?"

It was phrased like a question, but Lilith had learned by now that a question like this was not really a question at all. As he headed toward the cashier to pay his half of the bill, his date let out a silent sigh and gathered her bag to follow him, hoping to whatever deity that might have been listening that he wouldn't give her too much fuss over leaving tonight.

Handing the man her card to pay for her sandwich, she was surprised to feel the curling grip of a hand slide discreetly along the line of her lower back to rest against her hip. It was a daring touch, something no one had ever administered before due to her repellant attitude toward boys up until recently. She looked up, startled, in time to see Kevin shoot her a suavely innocent smile. But it wasn't until she caught sight of the wink that passed between the two men out of the corner of her eye that concern truly starting to creep around her insides like crawling vines.

She tucked her debit card into her bag, pretending not to have noticed. What she would have given for someone to offer her some sort of strength or courage; _something_ to make her feel less like a helpless little rabbit faced with a coyote.

The drive home was nothing short of awkward, at least on her end. The little half-smile perpetually haunting Kevin's mouth was quite calm, but she couldn't help squirming with discomfort when his hand found an opening to lightly squeeze her knee somewhere between putting the Sudan into park and stepping out onto the pavement. He had used the parking space which usually housed her currently dispatched Toyota, situated close to the stairwell leading up the four flights to her apartment, which forced her to do some quick thinking before she started for the safety that was supposed to be home.

"Thanks for the ride," she chirped, hoping to sound pleasant and grateful, "I'll be fine from here."

But it was clear when she turned to ascend that he was not about to be dismissed so easily. The sound of his footsteps behind her was an echoed ghost of her light trot, scuffing softly against the cement and nearly scaring the wits out of her when it suddenly stopped and he called, "_this_ one's yours, Pigeon."

There was a lilt of laughter behind the words, and she glanced over her shoulder to see him point to the door that was, indeed, hers. Apparently she had strode right by in her eagerness to keep distance between them; something of an embarrassment just as it was a reality check that she wasn't going to be able to shake him off as quickly as she had hoped.

"Oh," she attempted a laugh, but it came out rather like a winded gasp, "right."

Backtracking, she fiddled with her keys, fishing them from a pocket of her little green-and-white striped bag, firmly cementing her sight to the activity of her hands and away from the pair of dark eyes that seemed to be burning holes into her forehead. After a moment of harried jingling, she jammed the appropriate key into its lock and turned hard. She jerked the handle as soon as she felt the bolts click into place, intending to get inside as fast as she possibly could. "Well, 'night then—"

"Hold on a minute."

Kevin's hand was solid and firm under her elbow, pulling her back around to face him as she hopped for balance against the floor. He wasn't forceful, not really, but in her strange panic it didn't take much of anything to set her off; and that was enough to render her wide-eyed and shivery with dread of something she wasn't sure she knew how to name. Staring up at him with blank alarm in her face, she could do nothing but stand there, held by the grip he had at her elbows and the alien glimmer in his eyes.

"Don't I get a goodnight kiss?"

The red flag that had been tentatively raised when he had touched her in the restaurant was now violently flapping around in the back of her mind. Her brain could do nothing more than hiss, _stupid__girl,__stupid__girl,_ over and over in utter silence when he bent his head. In her inexperience, she might have considered it an attack.

The heavy press of his mouth to hers was something even he hadn't ventured to attempt so far, but most of the women she knew and loved would have called it dull or boring. Sure, his lips were rather dry, but what did she know? It wasn't as if she had much to compare it to, nor did she want to. At the moment, all she wanted was to throw herself away as far and fast as her body could manage.

Then, as if drawn by some instinctual reflex to find comfort and beauty within something she found repulsive, she could almost feel the meld of his lips from rough to soft and smooth, stubble-edged tan cooling to a clean, firm pallor almost paler than skin should have been. The brush of his nose to her cheek was transformed into the gentle wisp of light blond hair, scented like apple and clean soap, veiling a face that she could not quite see clearly in the stupor of the waking dream. Sweetly, a tender composition of affection and wistfulness, the weight of the gesture fell lovingly into her, invoking a tingling eagerness not unlike anticipation.

But she knew the illusion was a lie. Something inside her reacted to the cloud of disgusted fury that crackled and hissed in the air around them, rising in response to the hard, jerking tug of reality that pulled her roughly from the daze.

The man kissing her was not the man who had yanked her from death's clutches, who had been quiet and gentle with her even when forcefully dragging her out of the vehicle's way – the man who she would never admit to nearly-fantasizing about for almost a week and a half. The hands pressing her back against her door-frame were bare, gloveless, rough, and the lips now trying to pry her mouth open were coarse and somewhat chapped, not at all like she was sure her mystery savior's would be. Though why she imagining what some stranger would _feel_ like, she had no idea. In any case, with the strength and the emotive energy that was suddenly pushed into her, she was able to push Kevin away with a hard shove to his chest.

"_Stop,_" she told him, shocking herself with the fortitude of her own command. When she was able to register his look of miffed surprise in retaliation to the sudden reversal of control, she immediately reverted to sensitivity and shyness; a child unsure of herself, alone, and afraid.

"I'm sorry…" the haphazard plea was almost a whisper, thick with the mixture of hope and uncertainty in her throat. "I just can't. Not yet."

Not _ever._ She was determined now to make this miserable arrangement end. It wasn't fair to either of them, and to him especially if she couldn't patch herself up enough to relax around him without being perpetually terrified that he was either going to knock her over the head or eat her alive.

Yet it seemed to placate him. Smoothing his jacket, he sent her a sympathetic smile that was oddly blank. "Of course, I understand. But when you can, I'll be here."

He reached out again, and she could feel the tension swirling in the air around her like a literal storm of electricity waiting to snap, the presence that guarded her snarling like a dog on the defensive, invisible and improbable hackles raised. Her body stiffened, taut and drawn with suspense, but Kevin merely pressed another kiss to her cheek before strolling off with a wave. The gesture was almost a dismissal, his choice not to pursue the matter further. That flippantly domineering attitude alone made her want to throw up her inexpensive dinner. But it also made her rather sad.

A bit of physical contact wasn't supposed to make her feel dirty…so why did it?

In a huff, she turned on her heel and went inside, a bundle of chaotic thoughts and emotions without much sense of certainty about anything other than her desire to completely sever her tie to her so-called _boyfriend._ She called Alice that very night, asking the other girl to meet her for lunch the next day and to bring Sarah along. After hanging up, she contemplated how to bring up the issue to her two friends.

Even after getting her thoughts in order, she was restless beyond her ability to understand. Her hands itched and her brain refused to shut off, the nerves lining her spine were alight with a sense of awareness that she could not shake.

Knowing there was no way she would be able to sleep just yet, she left the safe comfort of her apartment, feeling the cloud of safety trail dutifully after her just as any other figment of the imagination would have done in its place, and trotted quickly down the morbidly active city streets. The destination in mind was a boutique doubling as a gift shop down on Adams Street called La Luna. She always bought her yarn from them and old habits, as they said, died hard if they chose to die at all.

It had been a while since she'd started a new project. Her afghan was still in the final stages of construction, but she had only needed to give it a single, disinterested glance at the bundle of needle-weaving before turning her back on it. Not tonight; that was the only thing she could tell the little nub of guilt that flared up when the unfinished blanket seemed to whine about abandonment. She wasn't in the right mood for something so patterned and ordinary. The yarn was too simple, the soft caramel color too bland, the texture too plain; when what she wanted, as she realized while meandering down the cozy little corner devoted solely to yarns, was a bit of a challenge.

Normally Lilith was more suited to use and purpose when it came to her crocheting projects – she was the practical sort, not one for finery without any job but to look pretty. But on some strange whim tossed out by a mixture of stress, idle nerves, and the restless bug, she found herself picking up and examining a skein of yarn she never would have touched before.

The raw, loosely-looped strands felt like woven silk to her touch, smooth and liquid soft against her bare skin as she rubbed some of it between her fingers. It was fancy, expensive material, synthetic fiber mixed with the wool from an alpaca, and sure to be a pain in the neck to attempt forcing into any shape. But it felt like heaven, and was also a riveting shade of deep plum purple. This she measured with some uncertain disdain, and glanced down at the baskets to search for a different color. But neither the brick-rust red, seaweed green, nor the dusk blue pulled at her like the purple did. Lifting the skein to her nose, she inhaled the musky, dry scent of wool and glue from the paper label, warm and clean and familiar.

She decided upon three of the generous skeins, plopping them down on the counter to be paid for along with a new needle, one much smaller than what she was accustomed to in order to properly suit the fussy nature of the material. The product would be small, tidy, a scarf perhaps since winter was on the way; but she felt satisfied that her restlessness would soon be cured with the help of the distraction.

The yarn almost seemed to glow when she watched her purchases sloppily stuffed into a bag by a saleswoman who was obviously tired and eager to close up shop for the night, the silky bulk shining dully under the light as if beaming with pleasure upon having been chosen to be crafted into something more. To be frank, Lilith quite felt like beaming too.

Yarn, she reasoned matter-of-factly, would not turn on her. Of that she was quite certain.

Yarn would not corner and frighten her.

During the two hours of time that spread between arriving home and dragging herself to bed, she managed to get a good five inches of the narrow, tightly-woven scarf started. It would be long, she had decided, stylish, since the yarn itself was so impractical already, and destined to have fringe on both ends when she was done. It wouldn't take her long. Though it was a bit of a pain to tell where the gaps in the weave were, involving much prodding with needle and fingers to puzzle out the right place to keep crocheting…but for the night, she finally felt calm enough for her weariness to catch up with her.

Teeth brushed, face washed, jeans exchanged for flannel pajamas, she lie back on her bed, blinking sleepily up at the ceiling, and pondered the possible scenarios that could come out of tomorrow's lunch meeting. Because she was no longer worked-up enough to be twitchy or anxious, thinking about it almost seemed to be like planning out an elaborate plot for some corny soap opera, raving on and on about what happened in a dysfunctional relationship.

She actually giggled once or twice when replaying Kevin's advance in her head, imagining the mysterious savior from a week ago showing up to send her would-be-suitor packing with nothing more than a frosty violet glare. She would thank him with a great deal more grace than she realistically possessed; he would smile again as he had before, so prettily and kindly. And then he would take her face in his gloved hands and kiss the grime away with his warm, soft, candy-sweet mouth. Everything unwanted or unclean would simply cease to be.

_I shall remove his scent from thy skin. _

She could almost hear the whisper float lightly upon the air; a soft brush of breath against her cheek when her eyes fluttered closed, filling her lungs with the faint, musky smell of skin and sweat, of clean and spice and apple. Sleep drew a dark blanket over her consciousness and smothered out the light. Yet still she could imagine she felt the gentle touch of a hand stroking the hair back from her forehead. It was an affectionate gesture, and watchful; the caring caress of some foreign presence intending to look out for her, to take away her fear.

While she waited for morning to come, she reveled in the soothing vibes issuing from the presence. Even from the realm of dreams she remained contented, peaceful and completely oblivious to the shift of power she had unconsciously accepted.

This particular power was held with a tender respect, lacking the grasp for control Kevin had sought. A man's touch from far, far away, from a world she had never attempted to imagine, descending from a source which had long yearned for the chance to offer such shelter. It belonged to her bodiless observer, her well-meaning protector, the guide and guardian who spoke to her with a lover's words.

_I shall wash thee white as snow._

It was familiar to her, an old comfort with origins traceable back to her early childhood. She had long ago deemed it a figment of her imagination, a conjured specimen of good-intentions and pure ideals to hide behind when she felt alone or scared or sad. Or perhaps it was simply a mental reaction to having been so alone for so long.

She had always assumed it was all in her head, as strange as that might have sounded to someone else. But she had never found a reason to loathe it. Thus far it had only helped, never harmed her, and why should she hate something that loaned her a bit of the courage to stand up for herself? While Lilith was half sure she was at least a little bit crazy, what she didn't know was that she was truly very sane and anything but alone.

— **Fourteen years ago —**

The sound of her mother and father's bedroom door opening harshly behind the swift patter of steps on thin carpet didn't cause the little girl to look up from her playing. After hardly a pause, she resumed her work on the blanket fort she constructing between the edge of her crib-bed and the windowsill, adjusting the lay of the thick, careworn comforter so that it might keep a level surface on top. Mister Frog deserved the best blanket fort she could make for him, after all.

Her mother's shifts never ended early, but while other children would have missed their mother between the breaks used to make sure the child was fed, this one had learned to steer clear of either parent. Neither mother nor father was particularly happy whenever she was around, so she kept to her room and found the means to entertain herself with what they occasionally brought.

When the edge of her mother's voice lifted with a protest, she took up her frog, green as her smock-like shirt, and padded to the cracked doorway. Looking out across the hall, she watched her father reach out for her mother's waist, halving her faded gray uniform and dragging her two steps backward.

"You used to like it," he told his wife, turning his face so that the words were half muffled by the woman's neck, where he nuzzled his cheek.

Her mother said nothing; merely turned away in order to unfasten her belt and slip off her low-heeled shoes. She was like that, quiet to the point of not saying anything at all to her small family for days at a time, or so the little girl recalled. The girl's large green eyes surveyed her mother's fine-boned face with its gentle slopes and customary yellow-green blotches. The marks were always there, though they always seemed to be somewhere new every time the girl looked for them.

Her father's hands grasped her mother's hips, pushing her forward until her knees bumped the edge of their bed, then slipped lower to touch her bottom. "Come on," he cooed, and for a moment the little girl felt like smiling. It wasn't every day she got to see mommy and daddy hugging. "Don't be so cold…"

She hadn't even processed her mother's cringe, shoulders hunching just enough to notice, before her father reacted, closing his hand around his wife's arm and forcibly shoving her down onto the bed. The woman let out a shallow cry, a sound that was partly muted by the effort made to keep it silent. The girl clasped the frog tightly to her chest.

"I told you to quit acting all high and mighty! You _know_ you want it—"

The man's hand drew back, but by the time he made contact with his wife's flesh, his daughter had turned and walked away from her door and the scene which lay across the hall. She curled up inside her unfinished blanket fort with one of her new, gently used picture books. Settling her frog in her lap, she read him the story under her breath, trying not to listen to the sounds of her father's mixed pleasure and rage entwined with the creak of an old bed's springs and her mother's painful silence.

...

"_Seriously?__" _Sarah shrieked; loud, incredulous, and quite nearly insulted. "You told him to stop? _Why?_ God knows you need a good kissing—"

"Sarah, shh. Let her talk." In contrast, Alice's soft, gentle murmur was a warm touch of calm, bidding her friend to be quiet. "Go on, Lili," she smiled, her pretty, heart-shaped face lighting up with that pleasant light she always seemed to carry beneath her skin. Alice was a beauty; pixie-like, delicate, and downright lovely, and yet it seemed that everyone knew it but her. It was part of what made her so humbly sweet.

Sarah still looked miffed. Her lips were pursed, one reddish eyebrow raised in something akin to suspicion.

Lilith sighed. "It didn't feel right, that's why. I told you two days ago I was having second thoughts about dating him, remember?" She cradled her after-lunch coffee in her hands, letting the steam from the mug waft upwards to warm her face and the discouraged expression there. "It's not like I'm happy about it, but I really don't think we're compatible enough for it to work. He wants me to be something I'm not, and I can't just change who I am. It just doesn't sit well with me. And besides, I don't have any need for hugging or kissing or any of that stuff."

Doe brown eyes closed, Sarah's bright hair flashed when she shook her head in comic dismay. "I told you; it's a nunnery for this one."

Alice shot her a withered look, clearly not amused, and the redhead sobered with a soft click of her tongue.

"Look…" Sarah set down her empty cup and pulled her knees to her chest, sitting sideways on Alice's living room loveseat to better suit her needs for both comfort and to look her deliberating friend in the eyes. "If you don't think it can work out, then I believe you. But part of me wants to say you're just being stubborn."

Lilith opened her mouth to retaliate with some measure of fact in her own defense, but Sarah interrupted before she could even begin. "Yes, I know your mom was silly and married the first man who showed her some kind of attention and you don't want to follow in her footsteps. I understand that. But are you sure you're not just overreacting a little just because he's a guy?"

The brunette was silent, surprised by the question as much as she was distracted by contemplating its worth. How probable was Sarah's point? Was Lilith just being paranoid? But that couldn't be; something had felt truly wrong when Kevin had touched her, aside from the stupid little daydream (which she was determined not to think about). That was merely second-guessing herself when there was nothing to second-guess. "I'm sure," she replied quietly, and somewhat timidly, just in case Sarah flew off the handle with her redheaded temper again.

"Positive?" Sarah pressed, "I know you have a sex-phobia, but if it's affecting you holding on to even a first relationship, I won't stand for it."

Playing idly with a strand of her bobbed black hair, Alice added, "most lasting relationships aren't based only on friendship or social compatibility…attraction has a bit to do with it too. Though that can come later, in some cases."

With a smirk and a nudge of her elbow into Lilith's ribs, Sarah interpreted, "she means sex is a good building block for a good match. Seriously though, you're pretty and sweet and it's no wonder he's attracted to you. It's not a bad thing." Her smile was hopeful. "Still positive?"

"I'm sure," Lilith insisted; chewing at her lower lip to keep the snappy retort about the negative, controlling and jealousy-inducing nature of anything sexual tightly sealed away.

Her friends had heard her anti-intercourse rant before, several times too, which was partially why they made so many jokes about nuns and chastity belts around her. It didn't bother her as long as they didn't push it too hard, which they avoided because they cared about her feelings too much to really want to pressure her.

She made it no secret that she disliked anything and everything to do with romance. Though occasionally they would try to lure her from her shell of chastity with coaxes and promises that it would be fun and that she would enjoy herself once she tried. Lilith adamantly refused to believe them. Once she had gone so far as to burn the cheap, tawdry novel Janelle had bought from a used book store for her eighteenth birthday (as a joke, of course, the real present had been a new pair of pretty star-drop earrings and a Starbucks gift card).

Now she was flatly determined to break up with her half-boyfriend as soon as she had an opportunity. If Kevin was so smugly sure that he could get her to sleep with him, she would have to prove him wrong, because she had no intention of doing any such thing. While wasn't feeling very cheerful about the whole prospect of doing so, and she didn't want to hurt him, she was certain that she was – under no circumstances – ready for the kind of relationship everyone seemed to expect. Nor did she think she ever would be. For some reason, romance always made her think of pain and betrayal.

She was so certain…and yet the self-assurance tasted bitter with the flavor of a lie.

The little meeting was called to an end upon the arrival of Alice's steady boyfriend, Elijah, who worked Saturdays at his contracting office. He took a look around at the little gathering, Sarah and Alice giggling while engaging in quite the epic thumb-war and Lilith with her face buried in her coffee cup, smiled in the lopsidedly cute way he had and asked if the pow-wow was something he should avoid. They had laughed and promptly scattered; Sarah to work and Lilith toward home to make the call that would ultimately snap the noose around the tie between Kevin and herself.

It hadn't been her intention to catch him between classes, nor had she intended to let him push her into confessing that she wanted to end things when she had mumbled about seeing him later to talk. Jumbled and awkward and feeling more than guilty for being cruel to dump him over the phone, the words had come out. Lilith was left staring dejectedly at the phone after he had hung up on her without a single word in reply to her rambled, apology-scattered explanation of not being ready for commitment. She hadn't expected it to end quite so suddenly, or so coldly, but she couldn't deny that she felt lighter when it was all over.

The rest of her day off she spent working on her scarf (which was turning into quite a pretty thing, if she did say so herself) and watching old tapes of her past dance performances to gear herself up for the start of the choreography season. She did have to work the next day, though Sundays were great for the premium pay, so she headed to bed early after a brief, brisk walk down the block and a hot shower.

Perhaps it was naïve to think the milestone was crossed, but she was positive the ordeal was over and done with.

How wrong she was.

Yet she wouldn't realize this until Sunday evening after closing up the library for the night. Stubborn as she was paranoid, Lilith (aside from everything else) happened to wind up trekking home in at dusk, alone and armed with nothing but the keys in her pocket. In central New York city.

Again, how very wrong she was.


	6. A Shadow on Me

**Chapter ****7  
**A Shadow on Me

Recommended Listening: "Shadow on Me" by Project 86 and "You are the One" by Shiny Toy Guns

* * *

Sometimes the human race, quite unremarkable as far as the worldly creatures went, proved to be quite intuitive.

A child comes home from school to find both parents gone when they should be waiting for him – his mother singing and busy in the kitchen and his father reading in the living room – and sees the back door left wide open. Scuff marks line the floor and several dishes have been thrown askew by some unknown force without a trace of life to be seen. Chances are that boy will somehow know that something is wrong. He may not know why or how he knows it, but still he may know to run to the neighbor's house to alert them to what has happened. He might call the police if he knows how, or a family member who can.

The tendency to notice these _wrongnesses_ sometimes seems to fade as a person ages. Adults with maturity-driven schemas would often be less likely to bother noticing anything out of the ordinary in their immediate surroundings. With exception to either side of the coin – child and adult – of course.

Human nature is not necessarily quicker or sharper than any other animal's; in fact most humans have been dulled by the lack of necessity for the survival skills imprinted upon them since their origin. Yet for all the watered-down and thin quality of his prey-driven awareness, the human race has been found to have truly remarkable relapses into the old state of their own senses.

Lilith had always been an observant child, favoring silence and preferring to watch those around her to engaging in any activity. The paranoia developed in her youth added to her natural suspicions almost tenfold as she grew, and that night was no different, not even now that she had passed her twenty-first birthday and was technically a woman and not a little girl. Something was not right and she could feel it.

She knew she was being followed the instant she turned onto Fourth Avenue. It was a flighty, warning tingle that traveled up her spine, a little trill that suggested someone was behind her, watching. Like something out of one of those cheap, run-of-the-mill horror movies; when the hero or heroine (despite perfect serenity around them) just happened to know that something was wrong. Right then, she didn't think she would ever insult those filmed moments ever again. The sense of creeping unease felt very real.

Regardless of how many times she might have attempted to justify that she was just making assumptions based on a mixture of circumstance and paranoia, it was no figment of any imagination. She tried ignoring it; for maybe the person whose steps she heard just happened to be going the same way she was. Lilith took another turn, just to see if their path would change – but it didn't. They turned as she did. Panic began to seep its horrific way up into her brain, causing her pace to match the quickening of her heartbeat.

_It__'__s __just __your __imagination,_ she insisted, _only __coincidence._ No one would truly follow her. Would they?

And yet the steady thud of footsteps increased to match her speed, following far too close behind for coincidence. The frantic jolt she received from having her fears confirmed doused her brain with frantic adrenaline. She let out her breath in an attempt to coax some calm into her system; a trembling whisper of warm air hitting the late chill.

Should she head towards the nearest police station? But perhaps she was simply being paranoid. It wouldn't be very pleasant to make a fuss about some mad ax murderer and attract the skeptical laughter and worrying glances of the nice policemen, and yet neither could she keep walking and thinking herself into spasms. She couldn't run to a friend – there was no way she would put one of her girls in danger. She had no family in the city or anywhere else to stay beside her apartment. Where then? Maybe the police weren't such a bad choice after all…

So intent on deciding what to do, she had neglected to watch the street in front of her. When her foot met something besides pavement, she stumbled with a small squeak, having not seen the figure pull out of the shadows. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she looked up. Much to her surprise, the face she met was a familiar one.

"_Kevin,_" she sighed, relief surging into the place of her anxiety. "You scared the heck out of me."

"Good."

Caught unawares, she initially mistook his reply for teasing until after her laughter lit the air and she looked up at him. That was before she realized that his face was twisted with a manic kind of displeasure, dark eyes burning with a pitiless chill. There was a depthless sort of anger in his expression which seemed unnatural, even _deranged_. It was frankly startling, since she was so accustomed to seeing a pleasant – if a little pushy – kind of guy. She found herself quite alarmed by the change in him.

He spat off to the side – a challenge and degradation – maddened eyes never leaving her face. "What, you thought you could get away with blowing me off like a bug?" His footsteps were heavy when he moved forward, coming close enough to make her shy and scramble backward, unknowingly cornering herself against the grimy wall just off of 7th and Lexington.

As if she hadn't felt awful enough already, his remark shot her through with a twinge of regret. "I—" she began, not knowing what she could say to make it in any way better.

Kevin snarled, "shut up!" and slapped her hard across the face, a gesture she didn't see coming until it had knocked her head back into the gray brick of the building behind her.

Pain hissed its unhappy words into her ears, ringing as though she were the clapper of a church bell. Her hand pressed to her flaming cheek while she peered up at him with all the ferocity of a frightened rabbit, both dazed and grimly saddened by what was happening. Something had indeed changed since she had last seen him, something which seemed to have pulled the hinges from the door between sanity and what lay beyond it. She had known she didn't really like him all that much, but this was not the boy she had consented to date.

Still, shouldn't she have guessed something like this would happen?

"I didn't mean to hurt you," she told him, looking down at her feet. "I just can't deal with a relationship right now—"

Kevin laughed out loud. "Hurt me? That's rich," he snapped. "I just don't like being dropped like a rock by some uppity little bitch." Lifting one hand he made a distinctly beckoning motion toward the way she had come, as though gesturing for someone hidden there to come forward.

The man that came up behind him was nothing really very special, a little larger than some, and tall, built rather like a boulder. She thought she recognized something about him (the owner of the footsteps she'd heard follow her, surely), as though she remembered going to school with him once, though his face had changed. Yet once she caught a glimpse of what he held in one solid fist, she lost all track of what memory offered.

It was the length and width of a crowbar. As he drew closer to the street light just a yard and a half away, she realized that it _was_ a crowbar, iron and forbidding. Her knees were already trembling, despite the fact that no real threat had been made to her with it. She had been hit with such things before, though never something so fortified and unforgiving as a metal tool, more like the legs of chairs and the occasional unbroken beer bottle. And yet all she could think about was the shocking number of near-death experiences she was having in such a close proximity to each other, and that this one might just take her life with it.

The beefy stranger passed the crowbar over; surrendering it to Kevin's waiting hand. When he hefted it with a familiar expertise that seemed almost sickening, he offered her a cold, crazed sort of smile which said he would enjoy cracking her head wide open. The metal rod arced upward over his head, balanced there for a horrible moment, and then came whistling down – aiming to send her brains splattering the pavement like a watermelon.

She had squeezed her eyes shut against the threat of terrified tears, waiting for the hard, explosion of pain which would cue the crowbar slamming into her skull. But it didn't come.

Instead there was the solid sound of a _thunk_ and the harsh intake of breath from Kevin's throat. Then there was a new voice, calm and cordial, and yet it struck something inside her which drowned the thoughts of vague familiarity from before. Perhaps she hadn't known the guy for an old schoolmate after all. But this voice she definitely knew.

"My sincerest apologies, I cannot allow you to do that."

Lilith's eyes snapped open and blinked up at the figure positioned halfway between herself and her would-be murderers. It took her no more than an instant to recognize him; after all, she had found her daydreams wander in the direction of his memory far more often than was comfortable. The guy had saved her from being squashed by a car, for goodness' sake!

While she had never expected to see him again, she was somewhat alarmed to notice that her breath had caught in the back of her throat at the sight of him. Her memory had retained his coloring, the sharp cut of his features and intensely focused purple eyes; but in her mind he had the impression of a teenager. Perhaps it had been the hood which was no longer present, or the unthreatening way he'd held himself then. Whatever the cause, it was gone now. This was no mere teenage boy.

Without the hood to conceal it his white-blond hair proved to be just as fair as it had seemed, and was drawn into a small ponytail. It looked just long enough to reach his shoulders when loose, and complimented the pale shade of his skin. Whereas he had seemed to dress to hide himself in shadow on their previous encounter, tonight he wore a pair of loose, blue-gray jeans and a trim, button-down shirt in a deep, plum purple which exactly matched his eyes. Over this was a long, fitted jacket which seemed to have been tailored from pure mirror-like silver.

While the effect of his appearance seemed a little on the eccentric side, she couldn't help but succumb to the relief of his presence. For some reason, she felt as though he wouldn't let anything bad happen to her, an assumption which, when looked as rationally, really didn't make much sense.

Twice now this man had come to her aid and twice she had felt the world stop with the beat of her heart around him. Nothing about this could not be normal.

Perfectly nonchalant, the stranger held the end of the crowbar as though he had caught it mid-swing; arm braced in the distinctive manner of one blocking motion-induced force. He was smiling, and yet the expression seemed cold in comparison to the brilliant warmth of what she recalled.

Kevin yanked the crowbar out of the stranger's grip – though it was strangely apparent that the other man had allowed him to do so – and snapped: "this is none of your business. Piss off."

The stranger's eerie gaze never wavered, nor did the polite airy tone to his voice falter as he replied, "on the contrary, it's most certainly my business. I cannot allow you to harm her."

When those eyes shifted to rest upon Lilith's awestruck face, she could feel the sparks of warm familiarity and odd, unprecedented knowing flare in the pit of her stomach. In a moment of mild distraction, he inclined his head to her. The prim, formal gesture was both strange and fascinating, and for an unknown reason, it made her want to smile.

And yet, out of the corner of her eye she caught the jerk of movement. When she adjusted, she saw Kevin's eyes flash with a crazed kind of malice and his arm raise, aiming a new strike with the crowbar – this time at her protector. "Look out!" she shrieked to warn him of the danger.

With light feet and a shimmer of silver, he stepped out of range, dodged the attack and sent the crowbar skittering across the pavement with a single blur of movement. Though she wasn't exactly one hundred percent certain, she got the distinct impression he had known about the attack before she'd seen it coming. But that couldn't be. His face had been turned the opposite way…_no_ one could have reflexes that good.

Cursing vividly, Kevin launched himself after his chosen weapon with little attention to spare for the man he'd just tried to maim. The stranger in question was, for the moment, grappling with Kevin's companion.

Though larger and apparently stronger, the rock of a man was having difficulty with her lithely-built protector. The stranger was constantly on the move, dancing easily around the attacks made by the ultimately slower man; shifting and dodging as though he had been made for it. Swift and smooth, the movements he used were almost liquid, a defensive fighting position she had never seen used before. He maneuvered as though he could literally read his opponent's strikes before they actually occurred, giving him the time to counter them in a fashion that was almost lazy, slapping away one attempt before ducking around another.

In fact, if Lilith hadn't known better (which, she supposed she really didn't), she might have said he seemed to enjoy the exercise.

"Don't just stand there, you moron!" Kevin yelled, "kill the bastard!"

She hadn't realized he'd returned, crowbar in hand, but jumped when his voice met her ears. Very slowly, she began to edge along the wall and away from him, hoping he wouldn't notice.

His friend glanced at him, distracted, and in that moment of broken concentration, fell prey to a sharp, sturdy rap to the base of the head. The flat of the stranger's hand struck him flat against a tiny cross-section of nerves in the spine which, when hit correctly, caused instant unconsciousness. Whoever said the body didn't have an off-switch?

A ripping pain gripped the base of her head, where Kevin – infuriated with the loss of his assistant – had seized a chunk of her hair and pulled. She whimpered; a sound that came unbidden to the back of her throat, and reached up to claw at his hand in an attempt to break his grip. The rage was too heady to beat off. When he raised the crowbar a third time, she was certain that this time he would find his target. Her eyes drifted closed, focusing on the sensation of the brick pressed into her shoulder blades and the scuff of her feet being dragged a few inches closed against the cement.

She didn't catch the flash of scarlet which turned calm violet irises a feral burgundy. She couldn't see them turn on the threat to her life with a menacing vow of retribution. All she knew was a sudden silence which was lit with the slide of fingers from her hair and several undefined sounds; a dull crack, a heavy thump, and the clang of the crowbar falling harmlessly to the ground. Cautiously, she let her eyes slide open.

There stood the stranger, staring icily down at the crumpled heap that was Kevin upon the concrete, with the crowbar lying innocently at his feet. He looked completely unaffected by the activity, or by knocking two grown men unconscious. The pale gold of his hair was just slightly mussed, jagged bangs shaken from where he'd tucked them behind his ears. As a matter of fact, it was strange how smooth his breathing seemed, the way his chest hardly seemed to rise and fall at all. Surely it would have taken some effort to cross several meters of distance, stop Kevin's attack, pull him away, _and_ strike him down without being struck back?

She glanced down at Kevin, awed and a bit frightened by her protector's show in strength.

A moment later he was there, blocking the fallen figure from her view with the width of his own torso. She peered up at him, taken aback by the offer of shelter. Yet his smile was kind, all the ice having vanished from those lovely, piercing eyes. "I wouldn't look if I were you—"

Defiance bit her like an insect. Lifting her chin, she determinedly sidestepped him to walk in a small semi-circle around the unconscious body so that the streetlight was to her back. At least he was still breathing, she figured, even he if did need some time to cool down. Suddenly she lurched away, the choked cry of horror and disgust flung from her mouth as she did so.

The back of Kevin's head was mangled and soaked with blood, his scalp split and his hair pained a sluggish scarlet. "Oh my god—" She gagged, clapping a hand over her mouth to deflect the coppery scent of blood. "What did you _do_ to him?"

The pale stranger looked mildly uncomfortable, as though he regretted what he had done. Nevertheless, he stepped over Kevin's motionless form to take gentle hold of her shoulders, steering her away from the two dispatched bodies and back toward the main street. His palms were warm, his grip durable and supportive while he walked.

"I split his skull," he answered, unabashed, "though I probably shouldn't have. I did advise you not to look—"

"With your _bare__hands_?"

She pulled away and out of his grasp, her wide eyes flickering downward to examine his hands. They were pale and clean, long of fingers, broad of palm, and powerful. If he had so easily cracked a man's head with them without so much as a bruise to show for it, he could snap her neck as though it were nothing more than a twig. True, he had not harmed her, nor did he seem inclined to, but what if he changed his mind?

This person was dangerous. She had known that even before tonight, since the moment he had prevented her from being made into a human pancake by reacting to her peril within a timeframe of milliseconds. Yet he seemed to have adopted a convenient pattern of being right there in the area when she was in danger. Why was that? What could he want badly enough to keep such close tabs on her?

She thought back to that other day; thought of the fragile, fluttery awareness that had returned to her trembling heart. It was inappropriate, she knew, there was no reason she should feel such an attraction to this near-complete stranger with hair that shone like a halo beneath the street lamp's glow. And yet it was there. There was a part of her – a significant part – that was comfortable, more comfortable than she had ever been with Kevin. More than she had a right to be.

Had she been smarter, or perhaps not so shaken, she would have turned and run by now. And yet she couldn't help but ask the question that seemed so innocently vital. "Have you been following me since that day?"

A gentle smile tugged at his mouth; a striking mouth, befitting an elegantly-carved facial structure. For a man with features as fair as his, he seemed remarkably masculine, perhaps due to the edge of his jaw being just a fraction too square, his cheekbones just a little too hollowed. Voice quiet, he answered her with praise. "Clever girl. But before then, as a matter of fact. I have watched you for longer than you know."

Fright shivered along her spine. Suspicion twisting her heart cold, her eyes narrowed and her desire for answers sharpened. "Who are you?" the demand was hard and loud, fueled one hand to curling into a defensive fist at her side.

"Under normal circumstances, I would have said, _no__one__of__consequence._ But now I believe you're ready to hear the truth."

Her blank look brought on another smile, and with a smooth, practiced bend of hips, back, and knees, he sank into an elegant bow. "My name is Azrael," he said formally, head bowed and one hand held flat to his chest. The emphasis in his words was foreign in accent and colorful tone, rich and flavorful, with more depth than anyone's voice should have had the power to contain. "I am the angel of death."

Lilith's eyebrows lifted, suddenly and surprisingly amused. Somehow she had flailed and tripped her way from two men who wanted her dead right into one who had apparently been stalking her and needed medication. Wasn't that just _peachy?_

"Uh huh… Well, thank you for the help, but I need to be going." She turned to go, passing under the brightness of the light, eager to be back in the safety of her own home. It was not a thought she would have admitted to having, but she did think it was a right pity he had to be crazy.

"You have no need to fear me, Lilith Everett."

She quite literally froze. He knew her name…but how could he know? She had told no one from her new life about her childhood, nor had she ever admitted belonging to that name. She hadn't legally been an Everett since she was sixteen. Turning cautiously, she stared at him, her green eyes wide with alarm upon the strange inkling that this was not a simple case of convenience in circumstances – _or_ simple insanity, for that matter.

He stood casually, handsome face passive and the hint of a smile still lingering in his strange, purple eyes. "Yes, I know your name," he said. "Your _real_ name. The name you were born with, your maiden name, your father's name—the name that you changed to one you found in a book when you turned thirteen, three years before you were emancipated. I should, after all, I've been with you for nearly the entire span of your life."

Lilith nearly choked on the air she inhaled. "You, wha—?"

She took another step back, nearly stumbling in her haste to put space between herself and the stranger who knew way more than he should. Calling him a stalker mentally had been only a joke, but it was petrifying to consider it might be true. Yet she was firmly convinced he was crazy. If this person had been watching her her whole life, he would have to be much more than a few years older and he looked barely more than twenty. There must have been another explanation for why he knew her real name.

"Who _are_ you?" She glared while she pressed him, determined not to show him so much as a trace of the fear clawing at her insides. "What do you want from me?"

He sighed, and the sound was soft, airy, his sharp features lined with patience. "You don't believe me. Though I cannot say I am surprised…" For a moment he looked apprehensive, hesitation flashing briefly across his face. Clearly divided between two choices, he debated silently, the shade of his eyes appearing to shift, rising and falling with lighter or darker hues under a trick of the light. She could almost imagine the irises melding with colors all over the purple spectrum.

Within another moment, however, he seemed to make up his mind. His broad shoulders tensed as he lifted his face to her, his eyes lit with a decisive kind of relief she didn't understand.

The tear of fabric was as harsh as a gunshot in the winter silence, colored vividly by the blinding flash of two brilliantly white wings bursting from his shoulder blades. Her gasp of mingled wonder and alarm stopped her breath as the twin, feathered appendages arced and stretched to a twelve-foot span before relaxing, folding against his back in a rest position. Graceful and pure, they were lined with a faint silver sheen and tipped with black along the edges, shaped like a raptor's with sharp edges. The rustle they made against his clothing was gentle, faint beneath the sound of her own heartbeat.

It was like some kind of sparkling, shimmering fantasy, and as terrible to her nerves as something straight from a horror movie, unnatural and unreal. Yet she could no nothing but stare, blink, and try to help her brain process what she was seeing. Another wan smile touched his lips as he stated simply, "see?"

Then his body jerked forward in reflex, holding out a beguiling hand. "No, don't—"

She hadn't even realized her mouth had opened to utter a scream, to give voice to the distress or the shock. But it hardly mattered as she was given no chance to do so. He was behind her in no more than the hint of a second with one powerful arm curled tight around her torso and his other hand clapped over her mouth.

Appalled, she tried to struggle out of his grip, fighting feebly against the restrictive barriers about her. But she gave up quickly; he was far too strong for her to fend off. Allowing herself to go limp, she submitted to the sense of authority, noting that he was more powerful than he looked. It must have been his pretty face that had made her think he would be more foppish than anything else; well-constructed and attractive but not quite so solid. She was marginally surprised by the muscled structure of his chest, abdomen and thighs, and just as surprised to note a fluttering jolt in the very pit of her stomach.

When he was convinced she would neither scream nor run off, he eased the palm away from her face and relaxed his grip, allowing her to face him again – something she did eagerly, having not especially relished the sensation of a strange man so close behind her. Regardless that he had probably just saved her life.

"Please, forgive me." He made her an apologetic reverence, palms held together in a prayer-like manner before his chest while taking a placating step backward, his violet eyes regretful. "It wasn't my intention to frighten you, but I can't allow you to make a scene before I can explain."

"Explain?" she breathed, staring at the downy white wings with a combination of disbelief and awe. They certainly matched the rest of him; strong, graceful, and utterly lovely. But the beauty of him didn't quite counter the spookily unreal tinge of something supernatural. "Who…_what_ are—?"

"As I said," he repeated gently, "I am the angel of death; Right Hand to the Almighty God, keeper of the Underworld and monitor of deceased souls, he who escorts the dead to their assigned destinations for the afterlife. I am called Azrael." After a brief hesitation, he added, "and I have been your guardian since you were little more than an infant."

Frankly, Lilith was impressed despite her own skeptical practicality. She wondered vaguely if she actually _had_ been struck to the head and was just lost in a world of hallucination. It was certainly possible she had lost her sense of sanity somewhere along the way to this moment, but then how could this particular illusion seem so real to her? She was quite certain angels didn't exist, everything logical said so. Besides…a guardian angel? For _her?_

"That's impossible," she insisted with a tiny shake of her head, "_you__'__re_ impossible."

She seemed to have struck him into a more serious expression. His amiable half-smile had been replaced by a somber, silvery kind of cynicism marked by the sudden darkness invading his irises. "Am I indeed?" he mused softly. "I burned out the fever when you had pneumonia as a child. I tightened the teeth your wretched father's fist knocked loose. I shielded you from the attentions of those boys you passed every day on your way home from school and from your lessons, the ones you were so sure wanted nothing more than to eat you alive."

Briefly, he glanced away, parting his focus from her and onto a moment locked away in time, unable to witness the disbelieving panic which leeched the color from her cheeks. "I set that broken leg you had last year, after the barre fell and cracked the femur in three places."

A hush fell between them, hindered only by her breath, misty and white upon the air. When he looked back at her, there was a kindly, amused light in his face and plum colored eyes. The color had actually changed, shifting with the fluctuations of his mood, twinkling with a mild-mannered humor. "Shall I continue?"

Her heart was pounding against her ribs, an ardent hammer both painful and hard. How could this be possible? _How_—and much more importantly, for what reason, for what purpose? He said it, all of it, with such conviction that she almost couldn't help but believe him; no matter what scientific law said, no matter how seriously she wished she could slap herself for wanting to trust such utter nonsense. It scared her, but she was oddly transfixed. What could she do but play along and hope it was nothing more serious than a dream?

"No, it's just…why would an—angel, care what happens to me?"

His arms crossed over his chest, wing feathers rustling gently as he did so (she glanced at them warily, still a little unnerved). A closed posture, it put a certain distance between them that betrayed a vulnerability, subtle though it was. "Now, _that_ I'm not sure you will accept so easily." Looking her in the eyes he said, "I know you're not a blithering, religion-obsessed idiot buried in meaningless lore—for which I'm grateful—but may I ask what you know about my kind?"

Lilith decided to ignore the small pitch inside her stomach, brought about by his verbal nod to her very non-religious ways. His eyes were kind, observant and polite, yet they still gave her the feeling of being hypnotized, as though he could actually see through her skin and into the places that made her function. There was also deep-set compulsion for her to answer buried behind the irises. She felt like a marionette and that he was tugging at the strings wrapped around her sense of control.

He had drawn a power from his question; urging for a response in a way that coaxed her tongue to curl with speech. Something had uncoiled within him, something distantly related to the sense of incredible strength that had coiled in the air around her like fine tendrils of some smoky, untouchable substance. It seemed strange in theory, yet it felt curiously familiar.

Complying with the gentle push she searched her memory, trying to recall the bits of scattered information she had retained. The subject of angels wasn't a topic she had done much in-depth research on; partly because she didn't usually end up in the religious section, but primarily because Christian mythology had never been her favorite to read on. She was partial to older, less prevalent myths. But that didn't mean she hadn't picked up a book every now and then to poke around.

"Well," she began a tad on the hesitant side, slightly unnerved by the eerie attention of purple eyes. "I know that Azrael—you, I guess—was…were sent with Michael, Gabriel, and Uriel to gather something for God to create humans with. You were the only one who came back, with dust, I think? So God charged you with returning man to dust. And…" she thought for a moment. "I don't know anything else."

"I didn't expect you to," he offered softly, "I am not the most popular of my race." With a small breath, he began to declaim as would an old-world storyteller. "In the beginning," he noted, "the Almighty created Lucifel, the Morningstar, who of course would live to betray his maker and find himself banished from heaven. After Lucifel, the Almighty created the four Elohim, or archangels; Uriel, Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. Then the Arelim, the _Hands__of__God,_ were created. These were; myself and Enoch, who is known as the Metatron or the voice of God."

None of this contained any surprises or shocks for his audience. On the contrary, Lilith's expression had an almost bored quality, though she still watched him with a suspicious note to hinder the very pointed question waiting on her lips. The question of how she could possibly be involved.

He noticed. A knowing light of affectionate chastisement told her, _be__patient!_ So she subsided to the impulse to hush and wait for him to finish, if a little grudgingly.

"The Almighty once told me," he continued, handling his words in a swift, succinct manner, "that I had been constructed in a manner different from any of my brethren. I had been born without a purpose engrained into me, thus for many years I was little more than a childlike entity wandering the heavens. That changed with the expulsion of the first humans from Eden." Lovely though it was; the smile which curved his lips was wry. "In that respect, I suppose you could say I was created as a fallback option for failure."

"Failure in what?" She bit her tongue, wishing she hadn't said anything. Asking questions would lead him to assume she believed him when she didn't…mostly.

A single pale eyebrow quirked into an elegantly arched line, displaying his amusement at her outburst. "Failure to keep the humans in Eden from birth unto forever," he answered. "They were originally immortal, just of a different creed and form than angels. But they disobeyed an order put in place for their own safety and were punished with mortality; hence my being assigned a purpose after a good five hundred years of existing. Death was a human quality, therefore the master of it needed to possess human qualities of some sort."

Perhaps it was strange, but Lilith could almost feel the importance of the weight he seemed to be carrying upon his shoulders. She shifted from foot to foot, chewing on her unease and anxiety, wanting to reach out and throttle him for making her stew over her place in a story that might as well have been drawn from a children's introductory bible studies text.

That in and of itself scared her; the passion which drove a desire to touch a man she didn't know (even if it was to smack him across the face for his rudeness) was totally out of character. It reeked of a familiarity that shouldn't have been possible. Because while she had barely known this oddity of a stranger for more than a few moments, she felt as though she had known him for years. Yet it never occurred to her to flee. The most pressing need was not to put as much space between them as she could, but to answer why what would have been an unpleasant situation to begin with had taken such a supernatural turn.

Cautiously, she watched him; followed the hair-thin flickers of emotion that flitted in and around the shading of his eyes, unable to guess their meaning and wishing that she could. He had his face tilted to the sky, clouded as it was with a threat of rain, as though the foolproof way to explain himself had been written among the stars.

"I suppose you know that angels love…"

She could feel the jolt in her heart when he finally spoke again and realized she had been lulled into a stupor by the smooth, carved lines of his face. It was a slip that she was startled to have made. He wasn't _that_ good looking, _darn__it!_

"We possess compassion and caring, but none are allowed to seek or develop any deeper tie—none except me." He turned his head to look at her, a subtle downward sweep that brought his eyes to meet hers. The contact was gentle, stricken with a peaceful longing that had no logical right to be so plain. When he smiled, it sweet enough to blind her to the hand that reached to wistfully, almost gingerly brush a few stray wisps of hair from her face. "I have a mortal's heart."

The light touch of his fingertips against her skin caused the tiny hairs at the nape of her neck to stand on end. Tingling trails streaked her cheek, left behind when his hand fell away, as warm as though he had drawn them with hot butter. She was stunned. Why she hadn't flinched or attempted to hinder him? What if he had meant to make a grab for her?

But why would he? For some reason she didn't think he intended to hurt her.

There was something about him that soothed her. Its definition escaped her, though the intimacy of it did not. The way he had phrased the last little segment of his speech had made her feel strangely lonely, as though her insides had been emptied and scraped raw without pain. He could have dipped his hand into her chest and squeezed for the throb of emotion she felt there. Yet she managed to brush it aside to question quietly, "why are you telling me this?" with the trembling confusion of a child.

For a moment he allowed those eerie eyes to close – just for a moment – to search himself for a scrap of memory that he had tucked away into a treasured, protected place. Fondness drew soft lines across his face, arcing with the shadows beneath his cheekbones and tracing a smile along his lips. The signs of a beloved memory, as she knew them. For the second time she had caught the echo of some deep, distant fragment of reality that had been a source of great joy. And yet she also caught the traces of sorrow, a slightly bitter aftertaste touched upon his brow with a subtle firmness. Whatever he remembered, it was not only a source of joy, she realized, but of great personal torment as well.

With a sigh, he gave voice to silent thoughts. "It was six years ago. For quite some time I had been occupied with other duties, detained elsewhere and unable to look in on you until then, when I had the scantest moment to get away." His expression seemed to soften, his voice rounding with the sounds and textures of words that seemed to pour into her, holding her fixed to the spot. Even if she had felt inclined to move, she knew she wouldn't be able to do so.

"I remembered you had just turned fourteen—it was the morning of your birthday that I was able to go to you. You had just gotten out of the bath, and I…" He paused, hesitant, brow slightly furrowed. "I was startled by the change in you. How could the child I had watched and protected since infancy have grown so without my knowledge? When had she become a woman?"

When he opened his eyes, she could have sworn that her breath had stopped. It was like looking a tiger in the face, or something equally as frighteningly unreal. There was the same hint of elegant strength concealed beneath his exterior, the same quiet depth and bottomless knowledge a human couldn't touch, as though she were looking a wild animal wrapped around the mind of a man and contained within his body. And at the same time, the anomaly of what he claimed to be – what he couldn't _possibly_ be – rendered her mute.

For all the words he spoke to her, all she could manage to think was what a beautiful concept he was. A silent, noble protector born of heaven; who in their right mind didn't wish at least a little that such a thing could exist?

Again, he reached out, this time to trace slender fingertips over the curve of her left shoulder. And that time she couldn't even consider pulling away. "I touched you just like that—"

The gossamer touch grazed her arm, feeding a tiny spark of recognition that came from seemingly nowhere.

She remembered the morning he spoke of; her fourteenth birthday. She remembered the bath she had taken to sooth the bruises from the night before, to wash away the stains left by tears from a heart wounded more deeply by fists than her skin could have ever been. And while it took her a while to dredge it from her memory – and another still to recognize it for what it was – she remembered the specific moment.

She had been standing before the old, rectangular bathroom mirror with a towel wrapped around her dripping body, examining the swollen imprint left by a hard slap to her face. It had caused her cheekbone to puff up rather unattractively. So much, in fact, that she had fretted that even snitching some of her mother's concealer wasn't going to hide the purplish mark. While gingerly taking measure the injury, the faint brush of what had felt like ghostly fingers had traced the length of the yellowing bruise which spread across her shoulder blade; the feather-light touch of a phantom.

At the time, she had suspected herself of imagining things, writing it down as a symptom of suffering from one too many hard hits to the head. It had been put out of her mind, replaced by the doom of school and questioning classmates.

But now this man – this…creature? – whom she barely knew was admitting to having watched her for most of her life without even the barest hint of her knowledge. By rights she should have been in a panic. Yet this stranger with whom she felt so familiar and wrongly at ease with was treating her with such reverence and courtesy that she didn't know what to think.

_Beautiful_, he had called her; despite the bruises and shallow cuts, despite her having been skinny and pale, little more than an underdeveloped child. She noted the way his eyes held hers while she looked at him, knowing (though unsure how) that there was an endearing affection in that gaze that paired with something else; something more than the mere happiness of looking her in the eye and truly being seen.

It was a look given by lovers; composed of trust, understanding and kindness cradled within the glowing coals that defined passion. Though she suspected he hadn't intended for her to see it, the message in those strange eyes was written clear as day. Clear as a song in the morning sky, colored with amethyst.

Could this stranger truly be trying to tell her that he _loved_ her? That he wanted…

The suddenly clench of her stomach caught her by surprise, he body reacting horror before she even realized she was offended. He had all but claimed to invade the sense of privacy, and she had no doubt that he was telling her the truth. For no rational reason she believed everything that had come out of his shapely mouth. That only made it worse.

How many times had he watched her like that, vulnerable and naked? Anger and mistrust welled up like blood from beneath a wound, her retaliation to the indecency of the matter flaring into prominence and shoving her alarm fiercely out of its way. What manner of _angel_ took advantage of a human's inability to see him?

Clutching her collar tight to her throat as though the clothing might somehow protect her, she took several heavy, unbalanced steps backward. "Y-you've watched me _dress_ and—and _wash?__"_

The instant the words flew from her scandalized tongue she realized she had said something extremely insulting. His eyes had turned dark, flashing with glittering sparks of resentment, his jaw tense with the strain of teeth clenched against temper. She prepared for a sharp slap, instinctually bracing for the impact of the physical strength which had injured Kevin and realizing that such a force would do a great deal more than just send her reeling. But when he finally responded it was to speak, and his voice was as yielding and docile as his shadowy touch had been.

"You have every right to question me and my intentions."

Her eyes mirrored the astonishment uncoiling in her chest. Had he actually just dismissed her accusation as being justified? She would have expected to be smote on the spot for daring to raise her voice to an angel of god, but she was still standing…what was she supposed to do now? Domineering, controlling tendencies, even violence she could handle; but she didn't know how to deal with such an undemanding kindness. Or unanswered questions, now that she considered it…

But it was as if he could read the sudden flicker of doubt creeping across her mind and clouding her surprise. "To my credit, and sorely bruised pride," his smile was only partly teasing. The rest was pure apology. "I always turn away."

Her eyes narrowed, unable to deny her own skepticism. Why would he look away when he had no need to do so? If this man truly had the power to avoid being seen if he wished, to hide from her sight and surveillance, why would he _not_ use this gift in order to obtain the flesh he wanted? He was certainly strong enough to restrain her, after all. If he desired to…but she didn't want to think about it.

He claimed to have looked out for her, protected her, but such actions were often attributed to obsessive attachments. In many cases protective instincts were driven by the need to keep a possession safe. And she was not his, nor anyone else's,_possession._

Yet while her feminist tendencies boiled over with indignation and insult inside, she understood that none of it seemed an accurate description to pin on the man that stood before her – wings and all. He didn't act like some psychotic lady-killer…but how could she know that for sure? He could be very good at his craft, good enough to conceal his real intentions. It was certainly possible, but no matter how hard and long she looked at him, she just couldn't see it. Nor could she understand why she believed in his honesty. It was unrealistic to be so trusting of a perfect stranger, despite his fantastical claims, not to mention foolhardy. But there she was; believing him.

Maybe she was too curious for her own good, or maybe she simply couldn't shake the fantastical lightheadedness resulting from his not-so-subtle claim of loving her. It wasn't something she heard every day – something _anyone_ heard every day. But despite listening to her girls squeal and sigh about their shared addiction to soppy, romance-rich material for so many years, didn't feel in the least bit flattered. Frightened, yes; violated, somewhat. Flattered, most certainly not.

More than anything, she was curious as to how someone who had basically admitted to stalking her for the greater part of her life (and there _had_ to be some kind of syndrome name for that) was acting like such a gentleman. It seemed paradoxical, in an unfinished sort of way. It made her wonder if she was really getting the whole picture properly.

She was still eyeing him warily, recalling his defenses with only a shaky conviction, as though he was an unfamiliar Rottweiler she wasn't sure she could safely pat.

The shade of his eyes cooled to subdued, serious lavender and his smile faded to form a look of almost stern resolve. "With all due respect," he noted smoothly, "I have hardly found it appropriate to take advantage of you in such a callus manner. Especially when you had no way to know of my existence and thus no way to accept or deny me."

A brief flicker of sorrow slid across his face. She caught herself wanting to reach out and touch his cheek, to offer comfort when she had no reason to, and carefully contained the impulse. "I know you better then you think," he said with a sigh that was no greater than a soft rush of breath, "had I made my presence known, you would have banished me from your life then proceeded to walk in terror of every shadow at your back. I did not want you to fret so."

Again she was struck by the language he used and the articulately elegant way he phrased his words. Old speech tailored to suit modern understanding; it seemed too proper, almost formal for the intimate nature of the subject. There was so much emotion in what he said. The heady mixture of remembrance, fondness and sadness seemed odd for someone who claimed to be an angel.

There was a gentle pause while the echoes of his warm voice were allowed to fade before he added. "You would not have wished me to, so why torment myself by glimpsing what I could not touch when it might have caused you anguish? It is not my way to force my own desires upon another. Least of all a woman without the physical strength to fight back—not meaning any disrespect." He inclined his head to her in a gesture of polite courtesy, to which she almost felt like smiling.

But when he looked up again, the mournful inquiry in his handsome visage struck a clean, sharp blow through her heart, a pain that ached within her chest like the throes of a seizure. "Would you injure my honor so much as to accuse me of such a thing?" he asked quietly, the question delicate and plain.

Quite promptly, Lilith felt ashamed of herself. Even if her silly fear of being seized, thrown to a bed or the floor and ravished was just as it was – silly – he made no comment on it being so. Instead of mocking or chiding her, he had addressed her worries with courtesy, not degradation. Maybe she could afford to be a little more trusting?

Taking a shaky inhale, she gathered her courage to look up, meeting his eerie eyes directly of her own will.

The breath caught in her throat the instant green met blue-violet; brilliant, bright, and proud, yet patient and honest. There was devotion there, and a vibrant, yearning fire that caused her stomach to squirm with anxiety. He let her read him; let her see how much he admired her. Not just physically, but with a caring, honest wish to nurture and cherish. He made his position chillingly clear. Having laid all his cards on the table for her to judge, he left her with the reins of control she had never had in dealings with a denizen of the male species.

Without knowing why, she could see that it wasn't in his nature to be cruel or hurtful. He would not do the nightmarish things her father had done to her mother. And yet traces of pain lingered behind the exposed soul, laid bare to her through the bottomless well of his eyes. She was alarmed to realize that seeing the haze of it hiding there hurt; like the real, solid burn of a sucker-punch.

The poor man, to be so honest and still receive nothing but her scorn—

With a jolt, she recalled that his comment had been a question, and she hurriedly answered; partially just to separate herself from that terrible, aching sorrow, "I'm sorry…I didn't mean to offend you—"

He smiled gently and held out a steady hand to quell her apologies. "I am not offended," he assured her, and somehow all traces of the sadness had dissipated as though it had never existed.

"So…" she hesitated, uncertain as to whether she should press the matter and risk impertinence. It shouldn't have been that important, but she had her quirks just like anyone else, and she wanted to know for sure whether her eyes were still the only ones to have had intimate perusal of her own body. "You never—?"

"Never," he answered firmly. "And never will I, unless you bid me otherwise."

Lilith felt her cheeks flush. She knew he hadn't meant anything inappropriate by it, but she felt a little shy nonetheless. As if she would ever assent to something like that…ridiculous.

No sooner had the warmth of the blush touch her cheeks; it was leeched away by the sudden, swift rush of blustery air. An icy hand plastered a boneless cold into her flesh through her clothes and wove a course shiver along her spine. Gooseflesh rose upon her arms and the back of her neck even beneath the blouse and heavy knit sweater.

Seeing her shudder beneath the chill, he shrugged the jacket from his arms and stepped forward to drape it decisively over her shoulders. "Come," he took her gently by the crook of an arm; his fingers curving beneath her elbow as he guided her gently back toward Sixth. "I should have gotten you home much earlier."

What had appeared to be rather flimsy fabric proved to be quite warm. The silvery cloth warded away the cold as thoroughly as a magical shield might drive away danger, allowing its heat to seep right into her flesh. It probably was magic, when she considered it. But even its strange, wonderful warmth was nothing compared to that which came from the grip of his hand around one of her limbs. That, she knew, was neither magic nor the addition of a layer. That particular heat was purely him.

She followed the guiding touch, absently noticing that he was leading her in exactly the right direction. Without thinking she blurted, "how do you know where I—?" but found the decency to blush and amend her mistake. "Sorry, I forgot."

His laughter was faintly musical, containing a soft, liquid melody that managed to remain partly dormant when he spoke. The sound of it caused her nerves to dull, stunned as though with several shots of Novocain straight to the brain, her muscles slowing and dazed as the notes poured over her like heated honey. Warm, rich honey; golden and sweet and beautiful for all its enchanting glory.

Laughter like that could almost make her believe that he actually was an angel.

Clumsy and distracted, her foot caught the sidewalk mid-step and she stumbled. She staggered to right herself, embarrassed by the lack of grace she had worked so hard to instill in herself.

He slid an arm about her waist, adjusting to hold her securely away from the threat of falling. "Careful," was his absentminded murmur, but Lilith didn't hear. Her cheeks flamed, unable to ignore the soft contact of his hand resting flat against her ribs or the slight press of his thigh to hers. She couldn't help comparing them to a couple taking a leisurely stroll together. Regardless of how severely she reminded herself that he was only trying to keep her from hurting herself because she was a silly girl with an instinctual weakness for his good-looks (to which he politely feigned ignorance to preserve her pride).

To her chagrin, _he_ seemed neither disturbed nor even affected by the change in position as she was. There was, however, a definite care to his touch. He appeared to be guarded; his posture stiffened beyond what could have been casual.

She peeked up at him from beneath her eyelashes as she walked; watching the sweep of his violet eyes as he scanned the darkened alleys they passed with the keen observance of a hawk. The angled structure of his face was darkly shadowed by the harsh, false light of the streetlamps spaced evenly along the road – and edge that seemed almost dangerous – but the pallor of his hair seemed to give off a golden, halo-like glow where the light touched it. She thought that to be rather fitting, yet when she glanced back at them, she saw that his wings had vanished, withdrawn to wherever they went when he didn't want them to show. If they had been there at all.

At the moment she couldn't find the energy to attempt wrapping her brain around the story he had offered, and she couldn't quite tell whether he was some hyper-Christian freak who had gone a bit off the deep end with an overload of knowledge. If he was, then he must have dragged her right along with him. Either that or she was hallucinating and needed just as much medication as he did.

Lilith was not quite prepared to consider the idea that she might be cracking up, but neither was she ready to really start puzzling and rationalizing about what was happening to her. It was enough for the moment to simply watch the strange, elegant creature move, study and walk along beside her like something out of a dream.

He walked her home as would a perfect Victorian escort, ensuring she had clear paths to walk across and no obstacles to trip her up, ever with the subtle pressure of his arm curved around her back. Half-protective, half something else, the name of which she very deliberately avoided thinking about. When they came to the junction of streets, where the signs read Sixth and Marion and the road turned into the entrance to the covered lot housing the vehicles owned by her neighbors, he stopped at the curb.

Shifting discreetly, he aligned his shoulders with hers and took her hands. They looked tiny and fragile comparatively, where they rested in his palms and where his thumbs traced small lines between her knuckles. It was a purely affectionate gesture, and against the calm stillness of his grasp, she noticed that her own hands were shaking. He must have noticed, for he looked at her with concern, clasping her hands more tightly as though attempting to offer her warmth.

"Your hands are trembling. Are you still cold?"

"A little…" she answered, somewhat pathetically due to an airy heady and a heavy tongue.

The angles of his face betrayed both sympathy and annoyance, the earlier for her and the latter for himself. "I'm sorry," he said, "I shouldn't have let you stay out so long."

Lifting her hands to his lips he gently blew, and warmth that was more than mere body heat flowed into her. It surged through her flesh, into her veins, inside her very blood to banish every single trace of cold as his exhale flowed over her skin. As efficiently as if put there by surgical tools, the heat fastened to some place inside her, hooked securely to remain fixed there like a tiny, internal furnace.

She blinked back her shock, startled by the sudden change in temperature. It was a little weird to feel the little flame radiating its warmth from deep inside herself, but she was too overwhelmed to give it that much attention. Of course, she could never let him know that it was not the cold alone that had caused her shivering hands.

With a quick smile he released her hands and nodded over her shoulder by way of changing the subject, his eyes sliding from her face to settle somewhere behind her.

Following his gaze, Lilith turned to see the clean, cozy stairway that led to her apartment, the familiar stretch of lawn offset by the neutral beige-gray of the walls. She took a hesitant step toward the stairs before remembering that his coat still hung about her shoulders. Gingerly removing the slippery, silvery garment (and marveling that she felt no colder than she had with it on), she held it gratefully out to him.

"Thank you," she said shyly, her eyes downcast, feeling suddenly anxious when his piercing eyes pinned her delicately to the spot. "I…um—" She very nearly jerked when his fingers slipped beneath her chin and tilted her face upward with a smooth, easy pressure.

Stepping forward, and standing almost a foot taller than she, he closed most of the distance between them. His other hand joined the first to frame her face. Hands that had cracked a human skull only moments before without a single trace of injury because of it were gentle and soft despite the strength she knew they held. They were smooth against her temples, with callused fingertips and slim wrists. His skin smelled of soap and spices, his hair soft.

She froze, arms growing slack, breath bated and her heart fluttering haphazardly against her ribs as he moved closer, their bodies nearly touching and their faces mere inches apart. She couldn't move. She didn't dare; half for fear she would anger him, half because she didn't want to, because the touch of his hand kept her pinioned in place. Because the lick of fire which melted into her blood beneath his gaze was utterly intoxicating.

A rippling, dangerous thrill danced down her spine when his eyes wavered. She could feel the caress of his glance like a physical touch to the curve of her mouth. The warmth of him surrounded her, filled her, coaxed her to breathe him in with the air she took into lungs that strained for reason. Lungs that fought the uncertainty that stemmed from the slight downward tilt of his chin.

Suddenly she was afraid. She knew that look, the imprint of want in the eyes that led to immoral things. Too many times she had seen the shattered, weeping, tormented results of such looks in women she had known – the kind of look that took without giving back. She screamed at herself, bitterly chiding what portion of her heart had even marginally hoped for anything good. But she could not move away. No matter how hard all her fears, doubts and insecurities raged and screamed at her, she couldn't find the strength to turn from him and end the quiet moment.

Somehow he sensed her discomfort and quickly withdrew, taking several steps backward to give her space; soothing, consoling reassurance flowing around her like the calm wave of a tender apology. And yet this nearly startled her more than the silent admittance of desire.

If this had been Kevin standing before her, there would have been no second thought, no offer of relief. If this had been Kevin, he would have kissed her, against her will or not, it would have made no difference. But this was most certainly _not_ Kevin. That he made quite clear, simply by allowing her to keep her personal space intact and unchallenged.

Moving slowly and carefully, he took her hand and raised it to his lips to touch a brief kiss to the tops of her fingers – the barest brush of skin to skin. The delighted tingling that touched at her nerves both shocked and frightened her, and she would have pulled away if not for one small fact. It was meant as an apologetic and respectful gesture, nothing more. Even still, she could feel the blush creeping up her cheeks and cursed it. She didn't wanting to look like a shy, sheltered teenager in front of this him.

Dragging her head up, she forced herself to look up at his beautiful face once more and saw firm, controlled features relax into a pleasant smile. In that moment she was sure that smile could have melted a glacier – for it certainly seemed to melt _her._

"It is my pleasure to be of service to you," he told her softly, replying a little belatedly to her expression of thanks. He released her, his fingertips grazing discreetly against her palm, and obligingly took his coat back. The silvery fabric was a streak of metallic color in the dusk when he slipped it on, folding the collar neatly behind the nape of his neck. She flushed and looked away when she caught herself eyeing the graceful line between his neck and shoulders, and the way the skin of his throat and hands seemed milky pale against the rich plum color of his shirt.

"I hope we meet again under better circumstances in the future," he lamented. "If you permit me, of course." He regarded her for a moment, smiling at her with a light, ghostly shadow of affection behind his sharp cheekbones and mystical eyes. Then he touched two fingers to his temple in a delicate motion not unlike the tipping of a nonexistent hat, and murmured a simple, softly reverential, "My Lady."

And with that, he was suddenly gone. Just like that; having simply disappeared into thin air, as though he had never been there at all.

She didn't know how long she stood there by the curb where he had left her, staring at the place where the strange, beautiful man had vanished into nothing. But before long she was forced to come to terms with the fact that she was undeniably exhausted. Her brain was fuzzy and humming with the threat of a headache, her eyes sore and tired, and her chest felt oddly compressed, like it might have after a serious bought of coughing.

Afraid that she might be coming down with something, she quickly ascended the stairs to her apartment. In doing so, she separated herself from the remaining link she had to believing what she had seen that night was anything but a figment.

Locking and bolting the door behind her, she kicked off her shoes and crossed to the bathroom to splash her face with cold water. Judging by the harried state of her hair and the smudges beneath her eyes, she concluded that everything that had happened from the time she had gotten off work until just that moment had been invented by her poor, overworked imagination. Too many late-night books and television movies had made their unpleasant mark; it was nothing more than that.

But, even as she was turning off the light as she prepared for bed an hour later, she couldn't quite bring herself to believe the excuses.


	7. The Name of Fear

**Chapter 8  
**The Name of Fear

Recommended Listening: "Hey Boys and Girls" by Evermore and  
"Eric's Grief/The Bleeds" by Nathan Barr [from True Blood]

* * *

The morning dawned as bright and chilly as the previous one, the sun settled high in the sky; a thin yellow disc veiled by a scarf of autumn mist. Yet it was late autumn now, for the cold air had a frosty bite to it which didn't have the lingering rose of summertime as did September. While the signs of oncoming winter didn't stop the bustle of city activity, Lilith had been looking forward to a day off. She was anxious to devote some time to relaxation away from the troubles and responsibilities of her regular work world. And judging by the dreams she had experienced the previous night, it was evident that she needed it _badly._

When she had woken in the middle of the night to go turn off the kitchen light (accidentally left on and streaming through the crack beneath her door), she had been disturbed by the images that slipped through her mind.

Imagining that Kevin would try to kill her because she had dumped him, as bad as that was, was only the tip of the iceberg. Because after that, she had unconsciously pulled the face of a boy she didn't know from the recesses of her brain and put an angel's name to him. She had given him great white wings and a kind smile, then invented a story involving this stranger divulging the tragic tale of his secretly pining over her since she had turned fourteen. Obviously there had been something off about her Marie Callender's chicken pot pie dinner, because she hadn't a clue as to where that had come from.

But that wasn't even the oddest part.

Normally her dreams faded almost as soon as she opened her eyes, but this one had been surprisingly clear. Every word that he had spoken to her, every stitch of his clothing, every angle and plain of his pale, handsome face; all of it felt imprinted into her brain as though burned there with a red-hot iron. She remembered the steady support of his arm at her back and the way he had warmed her hands with his breath, smooth, firm lips brushing her knuckles. She could even still see, when she closed her eyes, the way he looked at her so patiently, so kindly, with that soft white smile…

With a severe (and rather dizzying) shake of her head she promptly went back to bed. Such dreams were exhaustion-induced fantasies, unpractical and a waste of time. It was a mark of her need for a vacation that she had had one at all. Luckily she had rehearsals to keep her occupied and her mind out of dreamland.

Pushing back the curtains of the living room windows and folding back the blinds at the sliding kitchenette door, she padded lightly to kitchen to fix something for breakfast. Singing along with one of her favorite bands on the radio, she threw together some blueberry muffin mix and popped a filled tin in the oven. While not altogether a very accomplished cook, she had never had a problem feeding herself. It was one characteristic she was proud of.

With just enough time to dash in the shower and clean up, she was back in the kitchen dressed and ready, her hair already pinned in a neat bun, to take the muffins out to cool. Joined by a glass of milk and half a ripe pear, a warm muffin made a lovely breakfast.

When she walked through the studio door twenty minutes later, she was instantly assaulted by a high-pitched squeal very like a mouse being trodden on and a sandy-blond flash darting toward her. A strikingly familiar flash, at that. Delighted, she dropped her bag and spread her arms wide, just in time to emit a squeak as she was enveloped in a tight hug from the taller girl who seized her around the middle.

"Lili!" the blond girl cried, excitement spilling from her voice, "Lili, you're here!"

Lilith hugged her friend. "Hi Jelly!" she smiled at her dance-buddy's thin, bright face, downright thrilled to see her back in town.

Janelle had been away for several months in order to attend a trio of competitions in Chicago; but she hadn't been expected back for another few days, which made it that much more of a surprise to see her there for the start of the season. She and Lilith had been in the same class since Lilith had started as a late bloomer and had been friends since their first meeting. When it came to prancing and pointe shoes, they were almost inseparable.

"How was it? Did you have fun?" Lilith pestered, anxious to hear about the trip, though she did wrap her sweater a little more closely to her body. The studio was kept cool for the working dancers, and therefore still a little chilly.

"Oh, it was _amazing!__"_ Janelle sighed, doing a little hop-skip to emphasize the fact. "I did really, really well!"

Not the least bit surprised by the news, Lilith grinned and smacked the other girl lightly in the shoulder. "I believe it," she told Janelle while stepping aside to allow a newly-arrived young man (one of Simmons' students, no doubt) room to pass her and head towards the changing room. His dark head nodded with silent thanks as he did so. "You're a wonderful dancer. The judges would have been _idiots_not to see that!" Which was true; Janelle could have gone professional if she chose to.

Bashfully laughing off the compliment, Janelle retorted; "Oh hush, solo-girl!"

The reminder of her solo-duet made Lilith's stomach clench with discomfort and a thin coil of dread latch and squeeze around her stomach. She squirmed as she put on a false smile for her friend. Talk about bad boy-karma; first Kevin and the break up, now this craziness.

Her face must have had terror written all over it, because Janelle hurriedly added, "don't worry; you're going to be just fine. Partnering is fun! You'll see."

It was almost impossible to be anxious around Janelle. The girl had a gift for brightening up a room with her good moods, and Lilith found that she really didn't feel like going through the discomfort of spiraling into a nervous wreck. Janelle gave her a soft peck on the cheek. "I'm going to go start warming up. Go get your shoes on and I'll meet up with you in a few!"

Lilith bent to pick up her bag as Janelle hopped off toward the classroom and crossed the hall to the kitchen-dressing room. It was empty but for one other person; a young man, another of Simmons' students.

He stood with his back to her, his pale blond hair tied up in a tidy pony-tail and peeling off the light blue button-down shirt he wore over his uniform. Feeling cheerful after being reunited with Janelle and wanting to make a good impression on one of the students she would now be seeing rather regularly around the next few months, she piped up with a polite, "hello," to announce her presence. As she was setting her bag down on one of the counters crowded with the bags, extra shoes, warm clothing, and purses of the other dancers, she didn't notice him slowly look up.

"Good morning," he greeted smoothly while she fussed with the zipper of one of her numerous, beloved sweaters (Alice didn't call her the Sweater-Queen for nothing, after all). He had a beautiful voice, she noted. It was soft and dynamic, a low, musical alto with a warm, gentle, honeyed quality to it. Perhaps it was merely the combination of the salutation and the comfortable acquaintance she had with the building that made the tone seem so familiar, for she could almost have sworn she had heard it before. Curious, she sent a glance his way.

All she saw was the pair of bright violet eyes, wide, penetrating and deep, gazing right at her, framed by several stubborn tendrils of pale gold hair.

That face…she _knew_ his face. But she shouldn't have remembered him at all. Not like _this_.

She stared, astounded, her mouth dropping open and her eyes widening with shock. Her hand lifted, almost rising to her mouth before it froze halfway, hanging in the air beside the waves of shock radiating around her like ripples in water. He looked just like he had in her dream; carved and pale and powerful. Only it hadn't been a dream, had it? It wasn't shadow or illusion standing, tall and striking, before her.

"You," she breathed. "You're not real—you can't be…" She shook herself, her palm plastered to her forehead, violently set on banishing the vision her brain seemed to have spontaneously created out of a passing meeting that had barely lasted three minutes. Her head ached, because of the strain of seeing an impossibility come to life or because of the furious shaking she was giving it, she couldn't know. It was just that there was no _way_ it could be true. There was no way that this man could actually have walked back into her life.

But that wasn't right; he wasn't a _man_ at all…

"Don't do that." Large, cool hands slipped beneath her chin to rest against the sides of her jaw and neck, seeking to prevent her from giving herself whiplash. He touched her naught but gently, but Lilith reeled away from him; panicked by the recognition she shouldn't have felt for those hands.

Absurd though the events of her dream may have been, she couldn't understand how she could still remember everything so vividly or in such detail. Not unless they had actually happened. It was still eerily fresh in her mind, her memory of it as clear as cut crystal. Could it have been real? But that was _ridiculous_; it had been a dream, for goodness' sake, nothing more than that; she shouldn't have been letting it rattle her so hard. Whatever the issue, it was clear that she could no longer discern myth and petty, subconscious fantasies from fact anymore. All the same, something inside of her was not so convinced that insanity was the right plea to voice. Either way, she _had_ to know.

"Tell me you're not…tell me you're just—"

"Human?" His smile was sympathetic, filled with a warm pity that only matched the edge of firmness which lined it. It was an expression which made his smooth, youthful visage seem aged and wise. He still held himself like a prince, proud and straight, but at the same time he managed to possess a humble docility that almost could have found a way to endear him to her. For that was the part of him which seemed so familiar; the way he carried the weight of his presence, gently, so as not to weight her down with its potency.

It was different from the way his voice fluctuated to deny her half-hearted hopes that all the mess about god and guardian angels had just been her overactive imagination. "I am sorry, but I will not lie about that to comfort you. Pierce my flesh and I may bleed, but not for long."

And there it was; the confirmation of her fears. She hadn't made him up after all; this exquisite figure was an angel of God, a creature who had watched over her since childhood, a guardian and protector. But it wasn't just that. There was also the minute little detail of his claiming to love her, which was a lot more difficult to let slip away.

Was she going crazy? Was this an elaborate scheme concocted by her mess of a brain to tell her that any time now someone would be called in to lug her away to the padded rooms and a nice, crisp white straightjacket? Then again – all things considered – was that really much of an improvement? Would she rather be insane than have this beautiful specimen of a man admitting to having pined for her since she had reached maturity? Well…maybe not _insane,_ necessarily. But she had to admit there was a rub. She wasn't like Sarah; trailing after every good-looking young male she caught sight of just because he had a pretty face.

This was not a simple case of infatuation that could be brushed aside like a piece of lint clinging to her sleeve. The man before her was dangerous – he had proved that last night. She had seen what he had done to Kevin's head and all because Kevin had threatened her. It wasn't that she resented him for saving her life; quite the contrary, she was extremely grateful…it was just that it didn't seem out of line to question exactly where that need to protect and shelter came from. She had never really believed in the silly little spiels of women insisting that their men would fight for them out of pure, selfless devotion and loving intent. And if she couldn't put it down to devotion, then what could his reasons be?

Was it obsession? Was it because she was an untouchable human? Just because he had an angel's blood running through his veins didn't mean that he was immune to the things that could corrupt a human. After all, the first and closest of God's angels had fallen to the sin of pride.

If he _was_ obsessed with her, she wasn't thrilled about it, nor did she very much like the way he was studying her face so closely. So maybe she _could_ accept that he was an angel, that everything he had told her was true, or even accept that she was as crazy as he was, but it didn't mean she was under any obligation to forfeit her natural wariness. Having wings didn't make him perfect, all evidence to the contrary.

"Why are you here?" she demanded, stepping back to maintain a healthy distance between herself and the angel standing a few yards away.

The angel of _death_, she recalled scathingly, a patron of ill-favor and darkness – wasn't that what all the stories said? The ghostly reaper of souls who would ride his pale horse at the end of the world, feasting on the pain, grief and the dying wishes of the mortals he haunted. But he wouldn't dare touch her here, not in a public place surrounded by people. He couldn't be that mad…all the same, she was ready to run if he tried. She would scream if she had to, as much as it sounded like some cheesy movie, if it would keep him away from her. There was no denying that she was heartily freaked out.

He didn't come any nearer, however. Standing perfectly still, he merely kept his sharp, eerie focus on her face while answering briefly, quietly, "you know why."

"I don't," she insisted, looking directly at him, daring him to try and convince her otherwise. "Not why you seem to be _everywhere_ I _go_—"

"We have been through this," he interrupted.

She almost flinched before processing that his tone had been neither cold nor irritated as she had expected it might be. Softly as a down feather, and just as patient, he merely stated the fact that she was being difficult, though she would have wagered he would never be so blunt as to tell her that straight up. Simply knowing that gave her chills.

"I know you have not forgotten what I told you last night—"

"Lilith?"

The cry preceded her; and not a moment later in trotted Jessica, her face flushed with the joy and excitement that came hand in hand with the whirlwind of rehearsals. She rushed over to Lilith when she caught sight of her student. "Good, you're here—oh!" Turning slightly, she caught sight of the serene young man standing with his back to the counters and beamed at him. "I see you've met Mr. Harker already. Wonderful! Mr. Harker," she gestured to the still wary-eyed Lilith, "this is Lilith Gandion, your partner."

His nod was polite, his smile unforced as he murmured, "Just Adrian, please; Ms. Derre, Miss. Gandion."

Jessica gushed, obviously charmed by the calm, genteel manner with which the pale man spoke. "See?" She elbowed her student, whose expression was aghast with dismay, in the ribs. "I told you so."

_I __told __you __he __was __a __looker,_ was what she meant, but Lilith was too distracted with the collapse of her own internal support system to be able to properly interpret the intent.

"Anyway," she beckoned the two of them toward the classroom with a jerk of her thumb, "John and I are ready to start warm-up, so grab your shoes and let's get cracking!" And off she went, her heeled dance shoes making gentle clacking sounds as she walked, the soft swish of her wraparound skirt malting into the hum of gathered voices when she rounded the corner.

Azrael – or _Adrian,_ as he seemed to want to be called in the presence of other people – laughed quietly. While the sound was wryly bemused, it had the hair at the back of her neck standing on end, as the noise of it was oddly reminiscent of several chiming bells. Moving with a slow, easy grace that seemed biologically impossible, he dredged a pair of nicely worn slippers from the counter; the black leather stained a beige-gray with resin and use, its soles re-stitched in several places with thread.

"Imagine that," he mused, just loudly enough for her to hear, "I had my suspicions that I would be paired with you." With a mild nod, he turned his back to her and exited, crossing the hall to walk straight into the classroom, leaving her alone with her thoughts…and her fury.

She could have cursed Jessica for sticking her with the very man who she should have been trying to avoid. Leave it to her teacher to pull such a stunt, unbeknownst not. But, that wasn't entirely fair. She _knew_ the angel stalker had somehow pulled a few strings to mold the situation to his favor, which didn't seem beyond the rules of guardian angels.

Grudgingly, and rather petulantly, she stripped off her sweater and jeans and slid her feet into her pink leather slippers. She reasoned that it was probably better to play along, since causing a fuss would only cause trouble. After all, he hadn't hurt her. Did she have any right to act like a stubborn child? Decision made, she found herself walking numbly out of the changing room and following the carpeted path to the crowded classroom.

The combination of the two schools made for a sizable number of dancers. Lilith knew that John Simmons' school was much like her own in terms of size – accepting students in primary and secondary school as well as young adults up to the age of twenty-five – and that both schools were broken into separate segments, the students in one and the adults in another. With Jessica, performances would often be solely for the younger or older sections to perform in, but this one would be a combination of selected groups from both adult and student sections.

Due to the small space allowed to them, they were only able to fit half of the total combined student population into the building and still function with any sort of productivity. So today the building played host to the older portion; from juniors in high school to senior dancers in college or in service to the working world.

The room that served as a studio for the girls was clean and open, brightly and naturally lit with several high windows – which had open blinds to allow the late-autumn light inside – in addition to the dimming studio lights overhead. The floor was non-slick tampered wood of a light amber color marked here and there with white tape to point out the center of the room, dividing the space into quarters and eighths, as well as marks in other colors to provide spacing cues. All along the back wall below a group of wide windows ran the _barre,_ attached and separated in several places so that it could be adjusted to fit the students' height range. Along the opposite wall ran the seven-foot-high wall-length mirror, which allowed for full, close-range study of a dancer's position and placement in order to spot and fix any errors.

It was a nice, tidy studio, with a good stereo system for music and more spacious than many multi-purpose buildings in that part of the city tended to be. Currently, it was packed (though not uncomfortably so) with young men and women of varying ethnicities, heights, and ages; all of them with one thing in common. A passion for dancing.

The male and female students hovered in clusters consisting mainly of their selective class groups; the more inexperienced or not as skilled here, the more elite there, the girls to the left and the boys to the right. Lilith tried to be as inconspicuous as possible, quite glad that she was in an environment where she wasn't the only one who didn't look especially thrilled to begin mingling with members of the opposite gender. She ignored the scattered pairs of eyes that followed her and took a place at the movable barres which had been set up in the open floor between Janelle and Alice.

Janelle graced her with a smile before turning her attentions back to the mirror to work on the rather complex looking combination she had been practicing, probably with steps learned at one of the various workshops she had attended. _Such__an__overachiever,_ Lilith mused proudly to herself as she watched her friend work and listened to Alice relive the play her boyfriend had taken her to see with a combination of typical pre-class excitement and curiosity.

Then, almost instinctively, as though she couldn't help it, Lilith let her attention wander; glancing shyly toward the crowd of unfamiliar boys chatting away in their chosen groups. Spanning from tall to smaller, brawny to slender, she studied their faces and coloring. Her eyes scanned and searched, unable to pinpoint what she unconsciously sought. When she found the one she had been looking for, her stomach told her so before her brain realized he was there by lurching so violently that she was surprised some kind of bird didn't leap free from her body.

Perhaps it had been her certainty of dreaming that had made it possible to overlook how very unearthly he looked, but she could see it now. Something in the smooth, subtle way his hair fell about his face like pieces of feather, so pale and pure it could have been spun from sunshine. She had never seen it worn loose, but the short length of the ponytail informed her that it would have just reached the prominent bone at the base of his neck.

He had sleek, delicate bone structure, with defined cheekbones, sharp nose, and high brow. The curve to his mouth was firm, but gentle, belying laughter and a soft nature, and though the angle of his chin seemed boyish at first, a second, closer look revealed that his jaw was that of a grown man's.

While certainly prettier than Kevin had been, it was strange to think that he almost might have made the human boy seem more feminine than he did. Such was the power of beauty, she supposed. Not for the first time she lamented the waste of such a beautiful face lost to the clutches of insanity – though she supposed he wouldn't have been near as good-looking if he wasn't an angel. She would never have imagined that anyone with such a face could be a strong as he was.

Curiosity, unbidden but unable to be curbed, bit her like a particularly purposeful horsefly. Her gaze dipped and, though she did try not to, she couldn't help but notice the way the close-fit uniform of a white sleeveless shirt and black tight-knit pants hugged his form. _Very_ tight.

She swallowed, having found her mouth gone suddenly dry, and tried in vain to tear her eyes from the athletic curvature of the angel's muscular chest, abdomen and legs. One thing was certain; he may have had a pretty face, but his body was every inch a male's. The next certainty; he had the most beautiful body she had ever laid eyes on. From shoulders to calves he was nothing but firmed, toned muscle and flexible sinew. She had never cared for too much bulk, finding she thought it looked distended and gross, but he had just the right balance of slim and strong, enough to make her feel rather weak in the knees.

Uncomfortable, she gathered the will to turn away, thinking to return her scrutiny to his face while he talked with his classmates. Her eyes rose, sliding back up the line of one powerful arm – only to meet the onslaught of vivid violet irises clashing with hers. Instantly she could feel her cheeks flush with heat. But she couldn't look away from the magnetic draw of his gaze no matter how hard she tried. Not only had she been caught eyeing him, but any dignity she might have regained by hurriedly glancing to the side had been effortlessly stolen. It was as if he had pinned her to the spot, like a butterfly to a board, with no more than that glance.

The look he sent her was nothing short of smoldering. His piercing eyes swept over her light blue leotard and pale pink tights; taking in the bare arms, shoulders, neck, and collar left bare. Normally her uniform was second-nature to her, neither embarrassing nor awkward, but now she felt completely and utterly exposed. So much that she had to fight the urge to reach for Alice's sweater where it lay draped across the barre.

Yet what was worse; she felt no fear in that split second when his dusky purple eyes returned to cradle hers, looking deep into her wide green irises. Had it been any other man, she doubted it would have affected her so strongly. But when he looked at her that way, his proud, vibrant eyes hard with appreciation and soft with the tenderness of affection, she felt something inside her reply.

For that single, breathless moment, she wanted to fall and she wanted him to be there to catch her. She wanted those beautiful eyes to keep gazing deep into her soul and—

And then he released her, turning his white-blond head to focus that boundless attention toward the front of the room and the two teachers there attempting to call for order. His hold on her relinquished, the breath came rushing back to her in a choking gasp; it was an odd sensation because she hadn't realized she had lost it to begin with, despite the lightheaded buzz in her lungs. There was a light tingling left to course along her spine; a delicious, warm kind of shiver that didn't merely strike and pass, but remained there to run back up and down like a rippling wave.

Lilith had never in her life felt more aware of another person's presence. While her sight was fixed firmly on her teacher giving the run-down of the day's session and the week to follow it, she wasn't really paying them any attention, because it was locked on someone else: the place where he stood, only yards behind her. She managed to find an uneasy sense of security by the time Jessica instructed them to spread out and begin class with a few _pliés_.

Warm-up was nothing short of murder. She felt shaky, perpetually short of breath, and she just couldn't seem to concentrate like normal. It wasn't that the exercises were affected negatively, but she couldn't deny that she was distracted; her attention kept leaping back and forth between performing the right combinations and the undeniable desire to ponder the silent message which had passed between herself and her heavenly stalker. By the time _barre_ had been called to a close and the students milled habitually out onto the floor for the rest of their warm-up, she felt like she would shrivel up and die from nerves.

As though he had sensed the shy reluctance that had resulted from his long, daring stare, the angel had kept his distance from her – content to concentrate on stretches and combinations for both upper and lower body, performing as if he'd been a dancer all his life.

That didn't mean she couldn't feel his presence. It burned and beat at her like a living thing; both tease and torture eating at her stomach like a nasty bought of the flu. She didn't feel nauseous exactly, but it did unnerve her to realize how silly she was, reacting so strongly to nothing but a mere connection of eyes. It had only been a look. But it that was so, then why had it felt like the touch of a ghostly hand tracing the modest curve of her back?

Maybe she _did_ want to throw up…

After stretching and floor work, Jessica and John split up the boys from the girls to talk to their respective classes, where they would break their students into groups that would later become mixed ensembles or partners. Lilith listened to her teacher's pep talk with rapt attention, trying hard not to think about the situation she was in – partner, theme, and all else included – or the growing trickle of dread that was slowly turning her chest to a massive flutter of butterflies.

"Ok, girls," Jessica's pink-and-purple hair bobbed up and down as she retrieved her clipboard from a chair stationed against the mirror. "Here's the deal. John and I've decided to work with the combined small groups today. We want you to spend some time getting to know your group members, talk about your strengths and weaknesses so you can work better together. We'll be coming around and asking you to do some things, steps or whatnot, to give us some clarification on our choreography and your placement." With a bright smile, she clapped her hands and concluded, "let's get to work!"

Stomach churning unhappily, she watched as her fellow girls dispersed among the boys from John's class, the teachers sorting through the mass of dancers to ensure everyone found their proper groups. Smiles both sympathetic and somewhat slyly amused, Janelle and Alice bid her luck before trotting off to join their teacher for assignments. Lilith stayed where she was, feeling abandoned and uncomfortable.

As she observed, Jessica introduced her two friends to a pair of older males; one the dark, willowy boy that she had seen before class, the other a brawny, cheerful-looking brunette with a striking, practiced smile who eagerly shook Janelle's offered hand.

Acutely aware of her immediate surroundings, she knew she wasn't alone any more, and her body automatically stiffened when a long, slender hand gently touched her mostly-bare shoulder. "See him?" he murmured, "the one with your blonde friend?" She nodded stiffly, desperately wishing he would let go. "He would have been your partner had I not stepped in."

"So?" she aegued, her voice almost a hiss between her teeth to keep from being overheard, "he looks nice enough—"

"Jeremy Wilkinson can be agreeable," he agreed coolly, "when he wishes to, but he has a history of pressuring some of the women he has worked with…sometimes to the brink of violence, though I suppose I'm the only one here who knows that."

She blanched, feeling sick, and then whirled around so sharply that she broke his gentle grip on her shoulder, her retort teetering on the edge of anger while she glared at him. "So you throw my _friend_ at him like some kind of decoy? What kind of a man are you—"

"Miss. Martin can handle him," he corrected, calm as could be. "But you, I think, would have some difficulty."

"I can take care of myself," was her insistence, her chin stubbornly lifted. She looked him straight in the eyes, bold for her determination to challenge his assumption.

One pale golden eyebrow arched with subtle question. "Oh, yes? Need I remind you what happened with your drunken excuse for a suitor last night?" There was a tiny touch of bitterness to the tone he used; it wasn't accusatory, per say, but the slight edge made the words hurt like the sting of a pin to her heart. She already felt like a fool for having trusted Kevin, but it was worse to hear her folly spelled out for her by his voice. It made her itch with a cold fury. "It would be wise," he added, much more softly this time, "in accordance to your welfare, to let me—"

"I'd prefer it if you kept _out_ of my personal business, thank you," she snapped.

Almost immediately, she regretted it. Seeing his eyes flush with a furious burgundy for a shard of an instant was something she would never have expected to frighten her as much as it did, possibly because she had half-expected his anger would never show itself. His face darkened, hardened, growing cold with a stiff, silent rage. And with it, everything in the room seemed to grow dim and colorless, overwhelmed by the coiling shadow of an angel's temper. The fear chilled her to the bone.

But before she even had time to consider the possibility that she might have pushed her luck; the color faded. Rapidly his eyes paled, dissipating to a faint gray-lavender. It was a shade that made her think of sadness and grief, and most of all, of hurt, like the sky over a twilit, storm-wrought sea. All of a sudden she felt guilt gnawing at her insides.

It wasn't that she wanted to hurt him, she just couldn't find it in her to merely accept some near-stranger's insistence that she turn over her power of decision into his keeping. Her annoyance far outweighed her guilt at that point. Being angel didn't give him the right to make choices for her…and it didn't make him her knight in shining armor. She had given up on that kind of idea a long time ago. Yet even as she crossed her arms over her chest and stared icily back him, her heart trembled like a fragile creature against her breast bone.

Why did she always snap back so hard? Why did she speak to him in such a hurtful way? Was it because she was angry with him, because she felt threatened by the shift in control he was trying to force on her, as her inner-feminist claimed? Or was it, perhaps, because deep down she wanted to accept his offers of shelter and protection; to slip under his arm and accept the powerful, steel-hard shield he could have been?

In all honesty, she wasn't quite sure which it was.

Something inside of her calmed when he spoke to her; listened to and believed his claims, drew strength from his touch, wagged some invisible tail when showed his attention. It was ridiculous, fanciful foolishness, but it was there. And she couldn't, not for the life of her, shake it off. Was that why she was so adamant in her insistences that she neither wanted nor needed him? Still, where had she gotten the gall to speak to someone like she had just spoken to him? She had never been able to raise her voice like this, not to anyone…was that somehow significant?

Nearly an entire minute had gone by when he suddenly winced and pressed a hand to the left side of his chest. He had turned slightly away as if to hide it from her, presenting her with a view of his shoulder, yet from what she could see it seemed pained, a reaction to some kind of internal injury she couldn't see. His expression was drawn and tight, with a tense jaw to show that his teeth were clenched against whatever it was that plagued him.

He looked pale…too _pale._ The pristine pallor of his skin was smoothed with a grayish tinge that, on a human, might have been suffocation. What was wrong with him? Couldn't he breathe?

She was just starting to succumb to her alarm when he quite rapidly recovered. Straightening with a quiet breath and flashing another quick smile, he shot back at her, "I think not."

Lifting his arms above his head, he stretched luxuriously, lean muscle taut, elegant hands kneading the air as he flexed them, almost experimentally, and giving her an eyeful of his back (she _refused_ to let her eyes wander any lower). "I am not keen on allowing you to put yourself in danger if I can prevent it." After rolling his shoulders once and then twice, he let his arms rest against his sides. Then he tilted his head to peer at her over one shoulder. She was scowling at him, infuriated by his refusal to respect her wish. He chuckled, obviously amused, which just made her angrier.

"On another note, I'm going to say this now to avoid any later panicking on your part. I am almost certain that Ms. Derre will want us to perform some…" he paused delicately, his smile twisting somewhat wryly before he continued "…possibly suggestive steps. As such, know that I will not do anything you are uncomfortable with."

"What?" She gaped at him, surprised and a little confused. "I thought you just—I thought…" She fell silent, not entirely sure what she thought anymore.

"You though I just wanted an excuse to be close to you?" He murmured quietly, finishing the thought for her. "Well, I cannot deny it, not completely. But there _is_ more to it than that…"

His posture swiftly shifted, a small jolt like that of a shock, his words sharply cut off as he glanced up to see Jessica making her way toward them through the jumbled, chaos-ridden floor of groups and pairs practicing small step combinations and patterns. With his face carefully arranged in a friendly, open expression he murmured, "we will discuss this later—"

"How are you two getting along?"

Lilith turned, feeling more confused and incredulous than ever, to greet her teacher, who stopped just in front of the pair to eye them with appraisal and finite approval. "Umm…fine, I think—"

"Excellent," Jessica beamed. She circled the pair like a hawk, her fingers tapping absently at her cheek; pausing here to prod Lilith closer to_Adrian,_ stopping there to tilt her head a little bit before resuming her circle while her students watched – one with bated breath and the other with immeasurable calm.

And then she stopped altogether, clapping her hands together and exclaiming, "Ok! Lili, come stand here," she pulled the younger female to the fore, nudging and correcting so that she stood directly in front of the young man that was to be her partner. "Now, arms up for me—second position—and give the elbows a bit of a bend, palms up and flat…just like that—"

Lilith missed the majority of her teacher's instruction, her attention being evenly divided between following the directions and trying to block out the uncomfortable awareness of body heat that pressed against her back. She didn't like having him so close; her intuition screamed for her to move away, to do _something,_but her body didn't seem to want to obey.

"—ok now, Adrian, I want your arms under hers…probably behind the elbows? Yes, right there—"

She tried not to jump when Azrael's forearms slid beneath her own to form what could have been called a cradle using the inside joint of his elbows. The heat intensified, drawing her full attention to the intimate closeness of his chest to her back, the firm surface so close that the weave of his shirt brushed her shoulder blades.

"—this is a lift. Lili, you're going to jump so he can hold you, and then wrap your legs back around his knees to keep yourself up."

The color left her face in a smooth, incredulous rush of shock. She stared at her teacher, positive she couldn't have heard properly. "I-I'm going to _what?__"_

He began to pull away, the smooth skin of his wrists sliding from beneath her upper arms. It was like he sensed that she wasn't going accept the concept of what Jessica had in mind. It was then that she knew he had been serious; he wouldn't force her into anything. Maybe it was the fact that he was actually following through with a promise she had determined to be false that surprised her so much, enough to make her open her mouth and blurt, "ok."

She blinked, momentarily stunned. What had just happened? She was supposed to be frowning on this kind of activity, not passively going along with it!

To his credit, he seemed just as surprised by her agreement in his own turn, going momentarily still before obligingly shifting his weight into a wider and more flexible stance. She recognized the movement, the physical adjustment which would allow him to hold her better. His arms curved forward to snugly support her own; his palms open before her, the fingers slightly curled. "When you're ready," he told her quietly, his breath warm at the back of her neck.

Lilith sighed, resigned to her fate, perfectly aware of the leap she was taking (not only literally, but symbolically as well). _Watch,_ she groused, _I__'__ll__send__us__both__to__the__floor._But for all her self-doubt, she jumped all the same.

Muscle instinct kicked in, her legs automatically curving backward as soon as they left the floor like she unconsciously told them to, her abdominal muscles tightening to keep her torso straight, arms poised. Her legs hooked around his thighs, just above the bent, widely spaced knees, while his upper body strength kept her upright and almost completely mobile from the waist up. Yet for the lift's success, the room seemed to lurch and swim around her, making her feel cold and sick. She panicked, unnerved by the prolonged height which made her heart race and her stomach roll, and scrambled to locate something to cling to.

"I've got you." Azrael's voice, soothing and soft, reassured her despite her skepticism of him. His grip was strong and secure, his forearms sturdy and muscular beneath the clutch of her hands as he added, "I won't let you go."

There was a quiet undertone to the last statement that made her skin prickle and the hairs at the back of her neck stand. The double-meaning to the words he had spoken did not escape her, and it was enough to stifle her blind panic for stability. Instantly she realized the foolish act she had committed by allowing him the freedom to control her, even if only for a moment. A moment ago she hadn't wanted him anywhere near her, and now…now she had her legs wrapped around him, his face brushing the slope where her neck met her shoulder. And yet all she could think about was the short snippet of words and the power they seemed to press into her flesh.

Now that he _had_ her, would he ever let her go?

"Excellent! I can't wait to start on your choreography—I'm so excited I could literally die." Jessica laughed at herself, but her excitement was plain not only in the twinkle of her eyes, but the pleased expression she wore; a typical artist proud of her selected medium. "All right, you can put her down now."

Azrael's grip shifted, his hands cupping Lilith's elbows while her feet slid along the curved line of his calves to find the floor, setting her back to the ground she knew and understood. She stepped away, hoping the faint signs of her combined fear of heights and being held by a strange, frightening male-creature didn't show, and nervously twisted her fingers together, pointedly not looking his way.

"One last thing and then you're both excused for the night. Let's see a _balance_-_pirouette_ combination across the floor, please."

As if being driven by a force somewhere outside of her body, Lilith walked to the edge of the room to stand behind the taped line that symbolized the edge of the stage; the place where habit brought her whenever she heard the phrase _across the floor._ Since the combination was one she was familiar with, a routine exercise she had performed for years, it was easy to run through the steps while remaining free to breathe calmly and deeply to dispel the cold chills of her phobia.

While John had the students clear the floor for a moment, Jessica put on a simple piece of music with a piano-base; and Lilith tumbled into the old pattern of the steps and the music. _Balancé, balancé;_ three steps and a large, glorified walking turn. _Balancé, balancé;_ turn, and a brief pause to maneuver into fifth position before the _pirouette_.

Suddenly she felt a pair of strong hands at her waist, shaping and guiding her body through a double – no, a triple _pirouette_. She was aware of the three rapid turns, the whip of her head to her chosen spot-point and the pull of the muscles in her poised leg, but she didn't completely remember that she should have objected. Not until she ended with a straight-backed fifth position as if it were something she did every day. Subconsciously she felt Azrael mimic the position slightly to her right, and only then did she realize what had happened.

Jessica's intent had been to force them into displaying how smoothly they could improvise and pull together a coordinated movement. The exercise had been chosen specifically for its simplicity, meaning it would have been easy for him to convert to a partnered combination. It had done its work.

She never would have been able to crank out a triple turn without help. It had been _fun._ And for a fleeting moment, she lost herself in the slight daze of recollection. She barely noticed the rather possessive way he stood just behind her as Jessica spent another minute enthusiastically praising the two of them and their fellow students looking on with curious appraisal.

Yet at the back of her mind she was horrified, feeling violated by the ease with which he had been able to take charge over the situation with just a simple touch of his hands. She wanted to smash her head into the mirror just to get away from the beautiful man who so gracefully made her feel like she could do anything she set her mind to…if he happened to approve. She felt insulted, shaken, she was scared; and she was more than happy to admit all of it, including that she vaguely wanted very much to be sick. When Jessica signaled they could go and that the next class would be that Friday, she ran for the kitchen to change as though fleeing some kind of monster with sharp teeth.

She didn't care what anyone else though so long as she put space between herself and him – whatever he was. She would do anything, including being viewed as crazed, to be rid of the breathless tingling of connection that had warmed her blood through the heat of his warm breath and firm, sculpted body.

_Stop that!_

She was dressed, her things gathered, and out the studio door faster than she could have imagined possible. If it had not been for the familiarizing that the two groups of students were busy doing with their ensemble members, she never would have managed it. As the door closed behind her and the cold of the evening hit her full on, she let out her bated breath, and with it some anxiety. He was gone, and she wouldn't have to deal with him again until Friday. Maybe by then she would have thought up a plan to get rid of him for good.

"I'm sorry about that—"

Her breath stopped. She whipped around, nearly stumbling in her haste to back away as she gaped, hopeless with dismay, at the pale-haired angel who stood just a few paces before her, discreetly dressed in a pair of dark, loose jeans, casual shoes, and that long, glossy black jacket. _Jesus,_ he was fast; she hadn't even noticed him pass her in order to change. He'd never intended to let her escape…it had been nothing but illusion.

_Well_, she thought miserably, _at __least __he __isn__'__t __outright __stalking __you. __Nope, __now __you _know _there__'__s __someone __following __you __everywhere __you __go._

He certainly seemed apologetic as he pulled on his gloves, the supple leather fitting like a second skin across his hands while he watched her, a flush of regret in his eyes. "I didn't mean to frighten you back there. Truly, I wouldn't have interfered at all, but I didn't want to risk your safety like I did the last time I let my guard down."

Instantly she was intrigued. It was strange hearing him talk about her life as though he were a part of her, knowing every little thing about her. It was also, it was also a little on the scary side, a level right around terrifying. But even while she knew curiosity had done the cat in, she wanted to know what he was talking about. If his goal had been to engage her interest, he could pat himself on the back because it had worked…and she was no cat.

"Last time—?" she prompted when he didn't continue, shifting the weight of her bag over her shoulder. It wasn't heavy, really, just a bit on the awkward side due to its size and bulk of purse, warm up clothes, sewing kit and several pairs of pointe shoes, and it tended to bother her when standing in one place for too long.

The weight of his gaze changed, flickered downward to the bag making her lean to one side. Sounding irritated, he chided audibly, "what kind of a gentleman am I? God Almighty—here…" She couldn't have had her eyes closed for more than a millisecond's worth of a blink, yet when she opened them he was beside her and reaching to pluck the bag out of her grip, flatly ignoring the squeak of protest she uttered when the strap slid from her shoulder.

"Come," he said, settling the bag over his own, much broader shoulder, "it will do you no good to stand out here in the cold whilst I explain. I'll take you to dinner." With that, he strode easily by, walking gracefully and purposely down the sidewalk and towards the nearest intersection.

Dinner with _him?_ The idea seemed very uncomfortably like a date to her. True, she was a bit on the hungry side and it was almost five o'clock, which seemed like a nice enough time for an early meal. But once dinner was over, what would come next? Maybe he really just wanted to get her in a more suitable position to…

_Oh, __for __goodness__' __sake,_ she snapped at herself, annoyed with the perpetual skittishness. _He __isn__'__t __a __rapist __or __a __murderer; __he__'__s __barely __even __touched __you, __so __stop __flinching __every __time __he __looks __your __way!_

If he hadn't by now, she doubted he intended to hurt or maim her.

And so despite her initial hesitation, she followed him down the street, trotting at first to catch up with him. The smile of delight that brightened his handsome face when he turned to see her following willingly literally made her knees tremble. "I'm glad you didn't run," he told her, voice gentle as a whisper, his otherworldly eyes flushing with a pretty blue.

She tried to defend her reason for tailing after him like a lovesick puppy with the excuse of: "You have my bag…" but she doubted it really made a difference. The smile in his eyes and on his fine, white lips told her very clearly that he knew she was curious. But that wasn't her only reason for following. The second was that she didn't think she had the strength to run from him a second time.

Not another word was spoken while he led her down a few more blocks to a small Italian restaurant off of Fifth Avenue, the pair of them strolling in a silence that was not quite heavy enough to be awkward or uncomfortable, much to Lilith's dismay. She felt as though she had spent so much time with him that to walk beside him was almost natural, which wouldn't be right, because she hardly knew him at all. It was wrong to become so quickly accustomed to his presence.

Presence…now, why did that strike a chord?

"Hi there! What can I get you folks this evening?"

Lilith lifted her head and looked up at the waitress standing at the end of their small, corner table. The _Ristorante __Isabella_ was a nice, cozy little café-sized building embodied with the rich, warm smell of garlic, tastefully decorated in dark greens and golds, and much warmer in temperature than it was outside. Lilith had felt comfortable enough to remove her coat and gloves. The angel had apparently felt the same, peeling the gloves from his fingers and unfastening the first few buttons of his jacket.

They were seated in almost an intimate kind of seclusion, as the angel had requested, blocked from the view of most of the lightly crowded restaurant with thanks to the good-sized potted plant located slightly to the rear of her seat. The menus had been left on the table by a rather harried-looking host who had shown them to their table before retreating to help the next waiting customer. Azrael he had taken one and perused it with a faint amount of interest, flicking through it once and setting it back down to greet the waitress with a polite smile.

Being the observant type, Lilith happened noticed that the woman in question – Stacy, according to her nametag – was eyeing Azrael with something that was distinctly more than merely polite. Her black-lined blue eyes raked across the carved features of his face and she batted her lashes rather unnecessarily, leaning toward him in order to make her greeting softer and more personal.

It was in no way subtle, more like a blatant scream of _do__me__now,__sexy,_ but the slight bend did put the honey-tanned cleavage framed by the open collar of her white button-down shirt on nice display. At this, for some horrible reason, Lilith felt a stab of envious displeasure bite at her mood, swallowing the sour taste of bile that stung the back of her throat. She was actually _jealous._ Jealous of a woman who, she was certain, was far prettier than herself.

But Azrael seemed so calmly aloof that she wondered if he could actually be oblivious to the woman's flirtatious offering, pointedly and graciously looking to Lilith for an her order. Grudgingly following his lead, so did the waitress.

It was clear that Stacy didn't particularly appreciate that Lilith appeared to have the favor of her attractive male customer. It was written all over her face and crept into her heavily shadowed eyes, plain in the annoyed purse of her lips. Flushing with unease and shyness, Lilith ducked her head and quietly spoke up, "I'll have the chicken penne soup, please. And a coffee."

The waitress nodded a halfhearted assent, quickly jotting the order down on her notepad, and turned back to Azrael with considerably more interest. "And for you?" she asked again, coy, pretty smile curving the dark red of her lipstick into a sensual arc, an open demand for his attention when paired with the almost embarrassingly sultry undertone to her voice.

Yet his dusky eyes were on Lilith, the color dark and bottomless as a stormy sky when he answered smoothly, "Chardonnay, please. Just a glass."

"Coming right up!" she confirmed, gathering the menus with hands that ended in long, burgundy false nails. Tossing her dirty blond hair, she flounced off toward the kitchen to deliver the order, her skirted hips swaying just a little too much to be entirely casual.

Since it had been his idea to come, Lilith was surprised that he hadn't ordered food. "Aren't you going to eat anything?" she asked him.

With a gentle shake of his white-blond head he answered, "not this time." He rolled his eyes with a small sigh and added, "I wouldn't have taken the wine either, but a little bird informed me that our waitress would never have left us alone had I not ordered _something_. And my patience is not large enough to withstand that manner of badgering right now."

Guilty pleasure flamed like the lighted end of a sparkler inside her chest. She was happy he had found Stacy to be as irritating as she had, but the faint burst of pleasure she received from realizing that he found her company preferable to such a pretty and interested woman (with significantly more in the chest department, too) was something of an unwanted shock. The little coil of jealousy just managed to shriek its victory before she mercilessly stomped it out, forcefully turning her attention to getting answers.

He would have to be stupid to think she would so easily forget who and what he was, or what he had been doing since she had been a little girl. If he expected her to deal with his insistences of protection, he would have to start talking. "About what you were saying earlier—something about a _last__time__…_" she paused, almost losing the nerve to question further as he turned appraising eyes to her face, the irises a pure, soft shade that reminded her of violet gems.

At first she thought he was annoyed with her, but that fear was dismissed when his expression turned to one of thoughtful consideration. "I was, wasn't I…well, I suppose it is of relevance."

He clasped both hands before his chest, elbows resting against the surface of the table. "You remember the Halloween party you went to last month?"

She nodded. Of course she remembered; she had met Kevin there. Kevin: who had come after her with a crowbar not twenty-four hours ago, a situation which, quite remarkably, the angel before her had handled to preserve her welfare.

"Yes, well, so was I." He caught her skeptical glance and added shrewdly, "you didn't really think I would let you wander off among all those people without keeping a few close tabs, did you?" A delicate snort: "No. And it was a good thing I did; else I might not have been able to prevent that slovenly, pigheaded child from harming you last night."

The anger rolled off of him in almost palpable waves, drenching the air around them. It was mind-numbing, the thick, heavy cloud of his aura pressed in on her senses, drowning out everything else around her, from the table to the people chattering quietly around them. Like a living thing it seethed, all righteous insult and cold, hard, calculated fury. Wreathed in the potency of his rage, entwined within the force of his emotion, she could suddenly understand why the wrath of angels was something to be feared. He had her shivering in her shoes just by displaying the dark wings of his anger.

But it was not anger with her, but with himself – though she didn't quite understand how she could differentiate – which was why she didn't fear it. Kevin, she realized was the outlet and he was the source…or so _he_ felt.

"I thought I was being too controlling by not allowing any men near you for selfish fear that I would be putting you in danger. It was not fair for me to deprive you of companions or relationships if you could find them—so I let my shields drop and settled for merely watching."

The self-annoyance drew perilously close to hatred as his expression darkened, deep lines of shadow cutting the skin beneath his cheekbones. "For no more than a moment I was distracted, and when I found you again…" Lilith had to fight back the pang of alarm that seized her heart when a silent, wolfish snarl crossed his face, warping the lovely, sharply-cut features into something sinister and vengeful. Terrifying as much as his anger was beautiful, she instinctively wanted to shrink away from him, stricken with awe by the angel's righteous temper. "That—that lowbred mongrel's hands were all _over_ you—"

This wasn't exactly true, she noted with some interest. Kevin had only asked for a dance and he had been perfectly polite, keeping his hands at innocent areas like arms and back, but judging by the look on Azrael's face, one would think the boy had openly groped her. She shifted to look more closely, taking in the clenched jaw, and flashing eyes. Had he been jealous of Kevin? Laughter threatened to bubble up from her throat, but she quickly choked it, for the last thing she wanted was to vex her companion any further.

An angel of God…_jealous?_ Who would have thought it could be possible? He certainly had no reason to be – she had never found Kevin to be as handsome or as interesting as he was.

_Whoa __there, __where __did _that _come __from? __None __of __that, __now, __got __it?_

"I knew—_knew_—I shouldn't have trusted him. But I let it go, and look what happened!" He growled, "My neglect to trust my instincts left you vulnerable and could have gotten you killed and I…I don't know what I would have done then." Softening, the low melody of his voice calmed as though he had run his store of frustration dry enough to control. While he seemed fine, his face was just slightly tinged with weariness when he looked imploringly back at her. "It was fortunate that I happened to be in the area last night, but can you understand why I interfered this time?"

Though she was a little hesitant, she nodded just the same. She felt sorry for him. Such blind devotion seemed to cause his desires to both please and protect to clash, and he didn't seem to know how to do both simultaneously. On the one hand he could strive to make her happy by easing up his guard, allowing her more space and stepping away from anything that might compromise her freedom; but he also wanted to keep her safe, which seemed – at least for now – to be the prevailing choice.

Lilith was many things including hyper-sensitive, jumpy, easily frightened, and stubborn; but she had never once in the span of her life been cruel. She didn't receive any manner of pleasure from knowing that her own existence seemed to cause conflict and pain for the man who had apparently cherished and safeguarded her life as though it was something precious. In a quiet little corner of her mind she knew she didn't have the heart to chastise him. How could she blame him for responding the way he had when his actions must have come from such a deep, personal devotion?

But she _was_ concerned by the extremes he had taken. Of course she was grateful to him for saving her skull from getting knocked in, but had that really been excuse enough for him to have done just that to Kevin? And now he was taking the place of a potentially uncomfortable or dangerous partner. Yes, she was grateful that she wasn't at the risk of dealing with that, but she wasn't exactly comfortable with _him_ either, despite his manners and allure…she didn't _want_ to be attracted to him. Did he have to make the switch so bluntly?

She blurted the thought without considering how rude it probably was, "but why not just get him—Jeremy—replaced with one of the other students? Wouldn't that be easier?"

The curved of his mouth into an enticing smile was purely wicked. A tinge of mischief touched his eyes, twinkling as they were with what could have been tiny stars. "Perhaps, but I am the envious type. Why should I allow another to gain the pleasure I could have?"

There was a playful lilt to the figurative question that brought a flustered blush to her cheeks, and she averted her eyes to stare uncertainly down at the hands clasped in her lap. She wanted to be flattered, she really did, but something about his words wouldn't allow her to be.

As if he could sense her discomfort, he quickly apologized. "I am sorry," his voice was silky with the thin trace of regret, "that was a little forward."

At that moment their order arrived. The waitress set Lilith's food and coffee down with a very distinct lack of interest, shoving the dishes toward her with something close to animosity. Azrael's wine, however, she presented with deliberate gusto, sliding the delicate glass toward him along several inches of the table. Her fingers stroked the thin stem in a poorly-disguised hint toward something other than drinking. But this time the angel did not seem nearly so tolerant as he had before.

Eyes blank, he thanked her with a cool, disinterested nod while she simpered, "enjoy!" and as soon as she was out of sight, he lifted the wine to his lips and downed the lot of it in a single swallow.

Lilith stared first at him (surprised by the rapid intake of the alcohol) and then down at her food, realizing then just how hungry she was. Taking up a spoon, she dug into her soup, relishing the warmth and flavor of the chicken, tomato, and oregano while she discreetly watched the man across the table.

Gazing steadily at the empty wineglass he held between his fingers, he was still and calm like a frosted lake. "I would imagine that you still don't trust me completely," he said, "and I can understand why. I have forced you into a rather tight corner with all this information." He hefted a small sigh and put the glass gently down. Instead he held the tips of his index and middle fingers to his temple, where he slowly rubbed in an almost therapeutic manner.

At that instant, she felt concern for his welfare. She barely knew him, hardly even knew to recognize anything that fell between them, yet she felt partially responsible with the risk he was taking by doing such things for her. Wasn't it bad for an angel to be so attached to a mortal? Didn't scripture say that favoritism and attraction led to sin in God's eyes?

"Surely other angels have been damned for a lot less than what you've done for me," she mused out loud, watching his reaction over her food. "How do you know you aren't breaking some kind of law on my account?"

He looked surprised by the question, and didn't answer right away. As he straightened his hand fell airily to the table, where it rested while he spoke: "the laws were modified to the strict manner they keep now in terms of cross-realm relations, it's true, but my existence itself does not coincide with those laws. I am not as liable where they are concerned as most of my brethren."

The cryptic way he chose to give her answers was more than a little disconcerting. "But how do you _know?__"_ She pressed, gesturing with her spoon.

"Because my creator told me thus." His eyes flickered with several emotions at once, the color flashing light to dark and back with traces of annoyance, frustration, sadness, joy, and even amusement. "When God decrees that something shall be, there is no stopping it. Regardless of whether those decrees involve the turn of tides or one angel's necessity to love," he smiled. "Does that answer your question?"

She bit back a scathing reply, shoving another spoonful of food into her mouth to avoid saying something she shouldn't.

"As I said, I have not given you the best reasons to trust me," he paused, and then corrected, "in all honesty, I would have liked our first few meetings to progress rather differently, but fate seems to have taken that choice away from me—"

"I trust you. Well…"

She ducked her head out of mild discomfort when he turned his powerful gaze back in her direction, his strange eyes suddenly flushed with a conflicted meld of surprise, touched pleasure, and skepticism. Maybe it was something about his divinity that gave him the ability to look at her like that. No human she had met – and when you happened to work in a public library, one happens to meet quite a generous number – had ever managed to dish out a look quite like he could, with such an obscene amount of feeling locked inside. In fact, she wasn't even sure humans had the _capacity_ to.

She stumbled, tripping over her own tongue in attempts to fix the mistake in wording. He allowed her to, waiting patiently for the correction while treating her to that same, fathomless stare, piercing through her flesh to penetrate the soul beneath. "I mean—I don't think you're lying to me. I _believe_ you."

_Jesus, how hard could it be to choke that out?_

He cupped his chin in the palm of one hand, black-sheathed elbow resting on the edge of the linen-covered table as he quirked one golden eyebrow. "Do you, now? And how do you know that I'm telling you the truth?"

She thought about that for a moment, and decided that she had absolutely no idea why. But then again, no mere mortal could sprout wings or crack someone's skull open with their bare hands while not receiving so much as a bruise in return. Unless she was seriously cracking up, there was no falsehood anywhere that she could see. He had not exactly made any effort to hide the signs of his bloodline or his reasons from her. No, belief was not an issue. He had given her plenty of reason to believe his fantastical story. The real question was; did she _trust_ him?

"I don't…I guess I could just be going crazy," she admitted quietly.

"How do you _know?__"_

Her brow furrowed, her eyes narrowing in response to the words being hurled back at her with such an articulate swiftness, and deterred with protest. "That's not fair."

That was when he grinned for the very first time; clear, unabashed amusement that warmed his fine, icy face and took her breath away. It seemed to make him much more real to her, less of a refined heavenly dignitary and more of an actual living thing. Inclining his head to show agreement he mused, "no," as his pale bangs fell forward to veil his darkening eyes. "Not at all."

And yet he still expected an answer.

She frowned, laid down her spoon, and thought it over. Was there a specific reason? Was there any way to put a name or an explanation to it? She didn't think so, but the sensation of mild belief was still firmly lodged in her brain nonetheless. "I suppose," she paused for a breath, making one final sweep of her consciousness before asserting, "it's just a feeling I have."

The look on his face was strange. He seemed torn between insecurity and pride, the weight of his presence flickering with things she didn't recognize, igniting his irises with shade after shade of rich color. Any trace of amusement or teasing seemed to have been leeched from his being, replaced by that slight, wavering precipice of what might have been nostalgia. "Sometimes," he mused gently, voice soft and thoughtful as he let his gaze stray to the empty glass in front of him, "the things we cannot understand are the strongest we will ever encounter."

His voice fell to silence, all sounds dropped into the dense nothingness of quiet while he stared fixedly at the crystal-cut glass, and, not for the first time, she wondered what kind of things he had seen in the duration of his long life. But before she had a chance to ponder further, he seemed to awaken from his reverie.

Glancing across the table's surface toward her dishes, he frowned and inquired, "are you feeling all right? You've hardly touched your food." There was concern in his tone, a worried flex to the sound hinting that he was afraid that she might be taking ill.

She looked down at her soup, getting cold in its bowl while it sat, dejectedly, in front of her. She had almost forgotten where they were during those last few moments, having been thoroughly distracted by the talk of trust and belief and such. Of course, it was difficult _not_ to be distracted when your dinner companion was a man more intricately complicated than many men tended to be. "Oh, no—I'm fine. I'm just not very hungry anymore," she offered a casual shrug.

"I see." Short, simple, and curt. Lilith felt herself fighting a cringe in reaction to the lack of emotion in his voice, which had up until now usually remained so full of feeling and inflection. It was strange to hear it blank, cold, like he had wiped himself clean of all expression. He saw her pull back, however, reflexively catching the trace of apprehension that sparked within the stable curiosity of her aura.

"Forgive me," he murmured; the lush flavor of his tone much gentler this time, "my thoughts were elsewhere." Once again glancing at the dishes, a small, trained smile tugged at his lips. "It would seem appetite has forsaken this table. Shall I call for the check?"

He didn't wait for an answer, but seemed anxious to get outside, and made a gesture for the waitress. Lilith was fraught with a mild dismay when the dull tap of stiletto heels began heading toward them almost the instant his hand began to fall. She had never been able to do that. It required a significant amount of purpose and importance which she had never possessed, but she was not at all surprised that he did. He had the air of someone whose orders were followed when he chose to give them. Not out of arrogance, she thought, but because the way he held himself was composed with the poise and command of a natural leader.

Stacy brought him the bill with a pout on the side, her unhappy mannerisms projecting the disappointment that her handsome customer hadn't requested anything more private in nature. Pressing several gently-wrinkled bills to the table's surface, he paid quickly and murmured that the waitress was to keep the change. Apparently he had been quite generous because she appeared to cheer right up, scooping up the money with a cheerful wish for them to have a nice night before tapping about her way again.

"I could have paid for myself," Lilith protested, taken aback by the speed and efficiency he had forked over quite a bit of money, only a small portion of which had been for himself.

She hadn't expected him to pay. Of all people, he should have known she had enough money to buy herself some soup without taking hurt from it. Kevin had made it clear that he, as a starving college student, was in no place to be dishing out more money than he could handle, so she had assumed most relationships nowadays worked in a non-traditional fashion. Not that she considered whatever twisted thing they had to be a relationship.

When the angel gave her little more than a distinctly amused look as he stood and donned his gloves, she supposed that she couldn't rightfully expect him to be like every modern man. Considering the courteously genteel way he treated her, he was bound to have some old-fashioned ideals. It really shouldn't have surprised her, even if she did resent the amount of money he had wasted with a twinge of probably unnecessary guilt.

She bundled herself in her warm green and gray plaid coat, but fumbled with the buttons when she looked for her bag only to watch it lift from the seat beside her to be effortlessly slung over his shoulder. "You don't have to carry…" her voice died in her throat as he sent a searing smile her way, effectively silencing her arguments.

"But I will," he said firmly, holding out his unoccupied hand to her. "Come, I will see you home." And for the second time that evening, she followed him without making a peep of protest.

It had gotten much colder over the past hour; whispering promises of a bad winter to come. As the daylight faded the wind adopted the blustery, whipping edge it often favored for early November, and Lilith had to clench her teeth together to keep them from chattering. She kept close to Azrael, glad of his steady body heat for once, pressing toward the warmth that would have been stripped from his bones had he been human. Ever aware, he noticed her chill and, his brow furrowing with concern, took a quicker pace. His gloved hand cradled her elbow, drawing her closer to him in a distinctly protective manner to ward off the cold by wrapping her in whatever it was he could use to shape the air it his will.

But she didn't really care about the unnatural presence of what she guessed to be magic by that point, or about the physical proximity. The soft pulse warmth that exuded from his figure more than made up for his actions, and she had no objections to letting him guide her down the streets toward her apartment. The only thing she considered was how strangely natural it felt to walk with him like that, as though she had done so many times before.

It wasn't a long way to her corner, not much more than a brief jaunt, and before she knew it Azrael had paused just where he had the previous night, with the curb leading to the stairwell at his back. He turned to her with something like carefully concealed sorrow in his eyes. "This is where I leave you," he said softly, holding out the strap of her bag, which she took with a murmur of thanks.

She turned to go, feeling awkward and oddly shy, but he stopped her with a gentle hand used to grip her shoulder and she glanced back at him in question.

"I will not be at rehearsal on Thursday; I am afraid that I have a meeting that I cannot miss. But I have spoken with Ms. Derre, and she told me that if I will be absent then you have no need to appear either. Take the day off, get some rest and relax."

_Relax?_ She needed no relaxation, unless it was from him.

Though she was terribly curious about this meeting, she thought better of actually asking. Instead she nodded, acknowledging the heads-up, and turned back to the stairs and her cherished home. But he stopped her again, and her incredulous look was met with eyes full of affectionate worry.

It amazed her, the amount of emotion that spilled, shimmering, from him as he gazed down at her. There was such tenderness there, such a profound, picturesque softness that smoothed the angular plains of his face and the sharpness of his beautiful eyes. He had claimed to be in love with her (though perhaps not in so many specific words), and when he looked at her like that, as though he had just placed his heart in her open hands, she almost could have believed it. It was more the fact that he was so open about it that came as something of a shock to her. Wasn't it a blow to his male pride to wear such bold affections on his sleeve?

Yet there was more than a semblance of devotion there. In addition to fondness was the shallow wavering of concern.

Puzzled, she began to ask what the problem was, faltering for the words to articulate her questions under the pressure of that daunting stare. "What—?"

"Please," he entreated; the imploring delicacy to his voice so sweet that she almost could have hugged him. It made her want to brush the pale strands of his hair back from his face. She wanted to whisper and comfort him, tell him that everything was all right, that nothing would hurt him…and she was frankly disturbed. "_Please_, be careful. You have an uncanny tendency to find even the barest traces of danger within reach, and I cannot always be close enough to help you."

He touched her cheek with a gloved finger, the soft leather buttery soft against her skin and smelling somehow of sunshine. A wistful examination her face was somber with gray-tinted eyes. "Promise me that you will use good judgment and stay out of trouble?"

"Um…" She struggled to find the right response, touched by his fretful regard for her safety and rather preoccupied with how close he was keeping her, his strong fingers wrapped just above her elbow. "I'll try." She could promise no more than that. It wasn't like she went gallivanting off in search of trouble, it just came to her.

The corners of his elegant mouth curved upward to form a shadowed smile, sounding relieved when he murmured, "thank you."

Then he was moving forward, white-blond head leaning infinitesimally to the right as his eyes fluttered closed. She just managed to catch sight of the deep, sapphire blue which swirled to life amid the violet before they did so. He moved slowly, absentmindedly cautious, and if she had been thinking straight, she probably would have been able to pull away. But she didn't really anticipate what he intended, for she was so certain it was improbable, and found herself rooted to the spot, her limbs like wood and joints unresponsive despite her unease at the sudden breach of her personal space.

The breath caught in her throat when she felt his ivory lips brush the very edge of her mouth, firm, smooth and gentle. The sudden warmth of his skin against hers flared into brilliance, like hot honey being poured directly into her blood, swelling in her veins, and it lingered for a long, tortuous moment. The scent of him, warm and husky with the richness of cleanliness and apple spice, pressed upon her nose and wormed its way into her head.

She was shocked to realize that he was _kissing_ her; maybe not directly, maybe not impolitely, necessarily, but he was touching her in an intimate fashion all the same. Her heart lurched, beating against her ribs in what was quickly becoming alarm.

The faint contact of his hand at the back of her neck sent a shiver down her spine, too fearful to be one of bliss, slowly sending her paranoia teetering on the point of frenzy. What was he trying to do? Why would he bother holding her in place unless he wasn't going to let go? She tried not to move or even breathe, tried desperately to restrain the flinch of fear that forced her hands to tremble like a pair of withered leaves…and forced her to miss the sweetness of the moment he was offering her.

She had not expected him to notice her panic, much less to care about it, but he did and pulled away as though scalded, the hand she had seen as a cage fluttering uncertainly for a moment before he let it drop harmlessly to his side. He appeared shaken, as though he couldn't understand what had happened either. The wildness of his eyes displayed a myriad of emotions, flexing within the ever shifting shades of violet lined with lush, dark lashes.

Taking a step placating backward, he lowered his head with a shamed kind of apology. "You aren't comfortable, of course…I didn't—" His speech was broken, scattered, like he didn't know what to say, which seemed odd. He had never shown such an obvious weakness or confusion before. Yet he recovered quickly, taking a deep breath to collecting himself and corrected, "I apologize, I overstepped my bounds."

Her green eyes were wide, hopeless in her confusion and peering up at him through bangs that fluttered wildly under the touch of the breeze. Why had he backed off; merely because she had been uncomfortable? None of the other men she knew would have cared enough to notice, yet he had instantly reacted to her fright and released her.

A dull, painful panging within her chest drew her attention to the strange sense of sympathy she felt coiling around her, of forgiveness and compassion, which flickered through her like the brief shadow of a candle-flame. Perhaps she shouldn't have been so quick to jump to conclusions about him; he hadn't exactly cornered and forced her to do anything unpleasant. It was more like he had acted on what appeared to be affectionate impulse, bestowing a gentle touch to something he cared about.

But _why?_What could he possibly gain from treating her with such a reverent care?

She couldn't speak, merely stared, wordlessly, up at him with her arms hugging her ribs and her questions shivering on her breath. She didn't understand how frightened or fragile she looked to him, how vulnerable, how sweetly, innocently bewildered, or how much pain it caused.

The threads of emotion woven across his face were slightly sad. Even when he smiled reassuringly for her – a smile more painfully beautiful than any that had come before it – she could see the sorrow there, painted across his skin. "Fear not," he murmured, "there will be no second slip, I promise you. I will not kiss you again unless you ask it of me." Without another word he stepped aside. Touching the palm of his hand to her back, he gently, insistently pushed her toward the stairs which would lead her inside; calling a determined end to the conversation.

She went as he indicated she should, her pace a heavy, plodding walk, unhindered by stopping to look back, though part of her truly wanted to. When she closed the door to her rooms, despite knowing that he had gone by then, his words echoed in her ears; unending ripples in the still water of a pool. They haunted her, reverberating over and over in the back of her mind.

Once inside, she dropped her bag and slid her shoes under the bench below the coat-rack over which she tossed her jacket (and missed, though she didn't notice), and made her way to the living room where she plopped dejectedly onto the couch with a heavy sigh.

Would all her encounters with him feel like a fanciful dream coming to a sharp and ungraceful end? Emphasize the ungraceful part – she had been a clumsy, irrational _moron._ Disregarding the stupidity on her end, she could have smacked herself into a wall for looking like such a simple idiot; no _wonder_ he had moved away so quickly.

She violently shook her head, tossing the regretful spell out the door, not at all approving of the turn her thoughts were taking. One would think she had actually liked his kissing her. Well, it wasn't that she had _liked_ it exactly, but she hadn't thought it disgusting. Kevin's kisses, for all their briefness, hadn't been pleasant at all. He had smelled like old laundry and used a pressure unnecessary to make his points. What Azrael had done could barely even be called a kiss at all; it had been a mere peck of the lips to her cheek, as though he had missed his intended target.

But she knew it was much more than simple; and no amount of self-reassurance or internal bullying could convince her otherwise. He had not been aiming for her cheek.

And yet she couldn't help but admit, if only to herself, that there had been nothing seriously threatening about the placement of his hand. It had seemed more like an excuse for touch, not that he had been trying to force her to stay where he wanted her. Could she really have thought that he was trying to take advantage of her? There had been honesty in his voice when he had said that he wouldn't press her again…

She didn't especially want to think about it.

She reached for the television remote and flipped it on to the next movie she came across, which happened to be the new film version of Webber's _Phantom of the Opera_. A devout fan of the play and its music, she spent the next few hours curled up on the couch, nursing a small dish of double-chocolate ice cream, crowing along to the songs she knew, and trying as hard as she possibly could to ignore the loneliness she felt squeezing at her heart.

She would call Sarah tomorrow and plan a get-together. Knowing the vivacious redhead, this would probably mean another unwanted social endeavor similar to the Halloween incident, but at that point, Lilith couldn't have cared less, so long as she had company.

What she neglected to consider was the _reason_ for the symptoms of loneliness, distracted as she was by the unpleasantness of the feeling itself.

_Maybe __Alice __is __right,_ she mused to herself while getting ready for bed, recalling a conversation she had had with her friend about living alone, _and __I __should __get __a __goldfish __or __something. _She fell asleep while thinking up names for such a pet, her top favorites consisting of Velma, Houston, and Ripper.


	8. Mea Culpa

**Chapter 9  
**Mea Culpa

Recommended Listening: "Spellbound" by Lacuna Coil

* * *

As she had expected, Sarah was a whirl of excitement when Lilith informed her about wanting a girl's night out; almost to the point of screaming with glee and giving her friend a hug worthy of a pro wrestler. But once she had calmed and the two girls had settled down to their work, the redhead turned to Lilith and inquired, "but you _never_ want to go out. What's up?"

Lilith shrugged, feeling embarrassment color her cheeks a faint pink at the remembrance of why she had been feeling lonely. Tucking a stubborn tendril of hair back from her face, she hauled a stack of newly returned books to her table to get scanned. "I don't know. I just felt like doing something. So I'm willing to let you drag me out on another of your crazy adventures."

"Oh, _thanks_," Sarah snapped playfully, throwing a pencil eraser at her the brunette – who squeaked and laughed when it hit her.

"Anyways," the redhead punched the air with her fist, "this is perfect! There's this new club I've discovered; they have the best food and they're having a live music show Saturday night, which is nice because that's only two days from now!" Grinning rather evilly over her shoulder, she added, "of course, this means that we'll have to go shopping tomorrow."

Groaning exaggeratedly, Lilith rolled her eyes and swiped the last of her books under the scanner to check it in with more than necessary vigor. "Ugh. Only because I know you'll never let me refuse." A crowing of laughter danced about the office as Lilith got up and shoved the full cart out of the back room to begin re-shelving its cargo of newly returned items.

As she crossed the carpeted floor and its swirled green and blue pattern, she guided the cart out from behind the check-out counter and the nearby bay of computers and headed toward the nonfiction section. Feeling the prickling awareness of someone's eyes on her, she looked down to see a little girl with huge blue eyes peering up at her from just a few feet away. "Hello," Lilith greeted, smiling softly and putting down her armload of books. "Did you need help finding something?"

The girl's eyes widened when she noticed that she was being spoken to, and though she ducked her head, one small finger rose to point at the second-to-highest shelf on the nearest bookcase. "That one, please," she mumbled shyly, indicating a red-bound book with pristine white writing on the spine, which turned out to be about raising ponies.

Reaching for the book, Lilith couldn't help but want to pull the child into her arms and curl up with her. Children were such adorable little things; but she had never really learned how to talk to them, which had inspired her to keep a good distance. She pulled the requested book from the high shelf and knelt down to hand it to the girl, still smiling.

"Here you go," Lilith said softly, and smiled when the girl took it and hugged it to her chest. Then she ran off to cling to her mother's leg, holding her prize up for the older woman to see, to which the young woman cooed and praised her for asking all by herself.

It was days like this that made her job worthwhile; days when she could help someone, share the love and knowledge of the quiet world in which she worked, and yet seeing the young mother and her child made her feel a little sad. She couldn't begin to imagine why.

It wasn't as though she wanted to run off and get married and have children. Quite frankly, the idea terrified her. While she loved them, loved seeing their little faces light up, the prospect of giving birth made her want to hide in a closet. All the blood and the pain and the idea of some strange doctor's hands on her – ugh! Not that it mattered…she wouldn't have let a boy close enough to _breathe_ on her let alone get her pregnant.

At least that was what she had thought.

It seemed that the entire of her world was trying to rid her of the carefully kept distances she had created to preserve her own safety (or sanity). She had tried to keep that space in tact while dating Kevin, but he had proved too eager for things that she did not approve of. She had gathered the feeling that his respect for her boundaries had remained stable only because he was sure she would bend to his wishes before long.

And then Azrael had appeared. She wasn't sure what she thought about him, for while he seemed kind, and while she felt that the way he treated her wasn't a ruse meant to lull her into a false sense of comfort, but she still didn't really know what he wanted from her. He had never actually said. Did he truly want to protect her, or did he simply want her submission regardless of how she felt about it?

What was she supposed to believe? Was she supposed to turn her back on him and ignore the niggling response that tingled at the back of her consciousness whenever he looked at her? Or was she supposed to pursue it, instead? But how could she just shove aside her doubts when they might very well save her life?

Maybe she was over-thinking the whole situation and getting fidgety over nothing. On the other hand, that kiss had not been given lightly. She had caught a distinct light of pride within his eerie eyes, a measure of self-reserve telling her that he was not the kind of man that would press his lips to any nearby woman's mouth simply because he could – and she was fairly positive he could get away with had he wanted to.

Who knew how long it had been since he had last sought a touch of that kind. Perhaps that was why his contact had been so faint; as if he had been unsure of what he had been doing, himself…as if he had been just as nervous as she—

"Lili?"

She jumped, startled out of the rivers of thoughts sloshing around in her head, and promptly smacked her elbow into the shelf. "Ow—!" She bit her lip hard to cut the pain, her eyes watering as her funny-bone throbbed with the pangs of impact, and turned to see Sarah peering at her with concern.

"You ok?" the redhead inquired, "you looked like you were going to pass out from heat stroke."

Unwittingly, Lilith's thought jumped back a space to the subject of her silent personal debate, unable to prevent the slight reddening of her cheeks. She tried to banish it, to look aloof; but it didn't matter. Sarah's brown eyes suddenly shone with a sly mixture of interest and amusement. "Ooh," she cooed, careful to keep her voice lowered despite her excitement, "is it the dance partner? It _is_, isn't it?"

"No, I just—"

"Sure," Sarah interrupted, crossing her arms over her lime green t-shirt. "Come on, tell me."

Lilith glared at her friend, green eyes irritable when she turned away with a frown. "No! Go away," she snapped.

Sarah nodded knowingly, sure of herself and her guess. "Ok, but I know now anyway." Her eyes twinkled with fun and, ignoring the order to leave, she teased, "he's hot, huh?" It was a tactical ploy, meant both to goad the brunette into caving in as well as to embarrassing her.

"Oh—shut up!" Lilith lashed out with a paperback book still clutched in one hand to smartly smack her friend over the head.

"I'll take that as a yes." Mischief bubbling from her voice and her wicked smile, Sarah waved a brief farewell as she trotted back to work, away from the furiously blushing Lilith. "I'll see you later!"

Lilith's muttered remarks of scathing refusal were lost in the shelves, her voice cutting off into a silent fume when a sparse scattering of patrons milled to and fro about her area. She loved her friends to pieces, but there were times when they were far too nosy, and Sarah was the worst of the three.

She was doomed.

Eventually the vivacious redhead would have her spilling her guts out all over the place, like it or not. She would count herself lucky if she could stand her own personal challenge to keep her mouth shut and her dignity in tact over the next two days before the fated club-outing. If she could stand it, it would be a near miracle.

The workday seemed to fly by, filled with carts and small piles of items left out by patrons either too rushed or forgetful to put them back. She plowed through the first four hours of her shift; performing her hour of desk duty with little disturbance, finding the ability to be helpful when a middle-aged woman asked for her help in locating the cookbooks and an elderly man inquired where he might find something on financial accounting.

It wasn't until just before she took her lunch break that she happened upon a distraction even greater than the combination of a tired, fretful brain and anticipation for the upcoming date.

She picked up yet another misplaced book, and, upon checking the call number, turned and headed toward the early 200's section of the nonfiction shelves. Once there, she nudged the volume into its rightful place, only to realize that she was in the religious section, the metal shelving lined with tome after tome filled with content spanning from spiritual advice to page-by-page analyses of the bible. What a creepy coincidence. She had no particular draw to the subject matter for its own sake, but after a few days spent pondering words dropped from the lips of an angel, she couldn't exactly deny her curiosity.

The thirty minutes of her lunch break were spent picking at her apple-walnut salad (with raspberry vinaigrette) and pouring over the pages of a dusty book she had plucked from the little adventure into a miniature world of myth and legend. It was one of several she had chosen, but by far the most intriguing. The poor book looked like it hadn't seen any love for a good ten years. Its pages were stiff with a lack of use, the cover illustrations bleached in several places by an excess of exposure to the sun which came through the windows lining the wall adjacent to the shelves.

While she had a certain fondness for mythologies, under normal circumstances the book would have held little interest other than to serve as a passing amusement. Presently, however, she found the detailed explanations, retellings and lists to be fascinating. The blame for this uncharacteristically intense amount of interest she dropped unmercifully on the golden head still haunting her memory. Still, she was uplifted; her spirits rose with the hope that the books she had squirreled away in her book bag would help her to better understand the curious turn her life had taken.

Three hours later, she was trudging back home under her gray floral umbrella, the light rain creating a slough of wet which ran along the gently sloped surface in tiny trails. Whether it was the rain or the lack of sleep she had been suffering (or being splashed repeatedly by passing cars), a somewhat downcast mood was easily remedied by a hot bath and a fresh cup of coffee. She felt considerably better than she had walking home in the dark and the damp, if not quite cured of the nagging loneliness that seemed to eat at her like an acid.

The rhythmic, ritualistic pattern of crocheting soothed her while she sat curled in her chair in front of the TV around six o'clock that night, full of leftover chicken fajita and spacing out to a NOVA special on evolution. Her eyes were a little hazy, but she merely had to feel the stitches with fingers and hook. The soft texture of the luxurious plum-purple yarn ran through her hands like silk spun with tufts of velvet. Under, through, pull, pull, pull, and repeat.

All too soon she fell asleep, exhausted with an overdose of weariness and excessive, lip-chewing thought. Her head propped on the arm of the chair, she dozed her way into dreamland, not noticing the odd absence of the Presence which would have kept her evil dreams away.

It was possible that she might not have noticed either way; after all, she was only really half aware of the comforting aura to begin with. But with the lack of it plus the ragged state of her subconscious after being raked thin over possibility after possibility was not altogether very pleasant. She couldn't remember much of the dream itself when she jerked awake, disoriented and groggy.

But as she relocated to the bedroom she could distinctly recall the image of a regal white bird, its pale eyes despairing and raw, curved beak dull, pure feathers stained with a flaking, rusty red against a soot-choked sky. She couldn't explain why the vision had rattled her so strongly, yet the instant her head hit the pillow the ominous dream was all but wiped clean from her memory; lost in the endless void of sleep.

...

"You have _got_ to be kidding me." Lilith stared, dismayed, at her reflection, displeasure etched into every plane of her face as she turned her head to get another view of the dress clinging to her figure.

"What are you talking about?" Sarah picked at the short, strappy sleeve which looped over Lilith's shoulder. "It looks great!"

Lilith's green eyes took another long, disapproving look at the white empire-waisted dress Sarah had selected for her. It would have been fine if not for the rather low cutting V of a neckline and short skirt, which just barely reached mid-thigh including the light froth of lace at its hem. It was softly fitted and looked nice – flattering with a faint floral pattern which offered a quiet accent in black – but she found herself shoving the sash to one side and tugging uncomfortably at the back of the skirt, as if by doing so she could make it lengthen to her taste. She tried relaying this to Sarah, but the other girl merely shook her fiery head.

"No, seriously," Lilith insisted, giving the mirror yet another uncertain look, "I don't think it's right for me."

Sarah scoffed, "oh, Lili! You only live once." She angled herself to better see her profile in the ruched, tightly fitted party dress she wore, admiring the chocolate colored satin. "Besides, as your friend, I insist that you show off! You have such a nice figure; you should share it with all the pretty boys out there."

The look on Lilith's face was scornful while they changed back into their own clothes; not that Sarah could see it, for their backs were to one another. They had been lucky to get a changing room at all, for the after-work crowds at the mall had lengthened the lines close to tenfold; and the girls had felt no qualms about sharing one if it shortened the time it took to try on their finds.

Lilith, still put-out from Sarah's earlier teasing and by the fact that she detested shopping had remained stony and uncooperative, so Sarah had chosen the frilly white monstrosity for her. Now it seemed there was no backing out of it. That didn't mean she had to be happy about the situation, though. "I don't think so," she retorted, pulling on her sweater. "I'm quite happy as I am. And that would be _single._"

Sarah's mood was positively cheery while she tugged Lilith from the fitting room and off toward the shoes section of the department store, the two dresses folded over her arm, "I'm not saying Kevin turned out to be a great find, but I still think that you need to find yourself a guy. Just give it a little effort?" As they came to the maze of racks displaying pair after pair of new, fashionable shoes and shelves upon shelves of boxes, Sarah passed the dresses to her companion and dove into the clearance racks like a jackal pouncing upon its prey. Her expert bargain-finding skills soared with jubilance while she dug through the mess of shoes.

"Why does everyone feel the need to match me up with someone?" Lilith complained, "I don't need a man in my life to make me happy…"

The light in Sarah's doe brown eyes was so intensely serious that Lilith felt her voice die in her throat. There was a sadness in the frown that had taken over Sarah's characteristic smile – an expression so somber that she hadn't known the redhead could have possessed it. It was no more than a glance, but as the redhead mused, "Sometimes I really think you might," Lilith wondered why she hadn't seen the concern in her friend before that instant. While she had never imagined her girls' fussing and teasing to be based on anything but a playful fun had at her expense, she realized that Sarah, and probably the other two as well, simply wanted to make sure she was content and taken care of.

They probably didn't actually believe that she was happy on her own. And, in retrospect, maybe they had a point.

She watched as Sarah inspected the shoebox she held, giving its contents a hard, calculating look, simply watched; surprised by the alien severity that had momentarily seized her friend. But a moment later the heavy mood lifted, replaced by Sarah's victorious grin and the ceremonious dig into the selected box. "Now these are perfection," she said and proceeded to show Lilith the strappy, two-inch sling-back heels that had been nestled inside the cardboard and tissue paper.

"Oh, Sarah—not _heels!_"

...

The door to the meeting room had been left slightly ajar. Closing it, notes in hand, he moved to the table and sat down in the chair nearest to him before turning his attention to the other occupants of the area.

The room itself was plain, windowless, and completely lacking in decoration of any kind, furnished with nothing but the long, rectangular conference table and the straight-backed chairs lining it. The two people seated there, however, were neither plain nor ordinary.

Minos, Judge of the Damned, sat to his left. Moderate and averagely-shaped, the noble-born demon's hair was a snowy white sheet which cascaded down his back to a level just short of his waist. He had a hard face lined with deep thought and his eyes were a keen hazel more murky brown than green. Yet while a trace on the pale side, he would have looked quite normal in a room full of humans, excluding the fact that from the thighs down, his legs were those of a snow white tiger.

As the foremost judge tasked with assigning each incoming soul to its proper place in hell death's input, he was the demon that Azrael conversed with most regularly – and while the two of them shared the occasional disagreement over placement, they were a relatively civil pair. Minos was fair, and that was important. He was a sharp, unbiased pen in the world of hell's documentation, attentive in his decision-making and received the opinions of his advisors with both care and deep consideration.

The final occupant was one that Azrael had not met with directly for a long while. Sitting at a space situated across from the other two, the dark-haired demon lounged comfortably in his chair, one arm resting upon the table's surface as he calmly observed his compatriots. It was clear that he looked directly at them despite the fact that his eyes were shielded by the length of fine black cloth tied around his head like a blindfold, the material blending with the dark color of the hair which curled gently about his ears and neck, just barely brushing the tops of his shoulders.

This was Mastema, the Father of Woe. With a handsomely aged and articulate face, he was mildly hawk-like, his lips thin and expressive, his nose curved. Lean, fit, and softly muscular, quick as lightning and powerful like the best of swords; his manner was stern and formal, his words soft and his council frank. Yet due to the Specialty's preference to keeping his own council, Azrael had not come face-to-face with him in decades, having been too distracted by other things to warrant seeking the older entity's counsel – as he had quite often before, for Mastema was one of the oldest and wisest beings in the realm.

During the earlier days, Azrael had been often troubled by the weight of his own status and the decisions he had to make regarding his job. Death was a difficult position to keep, and one that had taken the angel many long, troubled years to ease into. Mastema, his own post far less of a hassle than the young angel's, had been his constant second-opinion, giving him advice that had helped him reach a certain level of stability. Whenever Azrael had needed someone to listen to his deliberations and inner debates of uncertainty, Mastema had been there to offer a ready ear, an open mind, and a wise word or two.

This was one of the primary reasons why the angel of death hadn't turned out madder than a march hare.

This relationship had been well established three hundred years before the unrequited birth of the crown prince and the banishment of the woe-begotten queen who had once resided over hell. For his part, Mastema had advocated for the suffering queen's position, counseling the indifferent Lucifer to listen to his bride's wishes and formally accept his firstborn son.

But Lucifer had turned away from the infant and mother, sending his queen to an eternal punishment for challenging him and pushing the baby aside; unwilling, or perhaps unfit to care for the tiny child. Therefore Mastema had taken the abandoned dracling under his own wing, raising the infant Beelzebub as though the child had been his own son, teaching him to take the throne of government that his birth-father had ignored for centuries.

Presently, the older demon served as an advisor to the prince, whom he had long regarded as the _true_ ruler of hell. The duties he kept were evenly dispersed between serving on the council that made up the ruler's advisors for the realm and his original charge of commanding the Sorrows. The Sorrows themselves were a small army of entities which roamed wherever there was sorrow, distress, and unhappiness upon the earth, feeding off of and boosting the strength of misery. Though they did not need the constant attention of their master like the Horrors or the Sins did, they could be something of a handful and required a strict charge to keep them in line. Because of this, Mastema was, roughly speaking, the demon of angst.

A brief nod was exchanged between angel and dark-haired demon, both politely respectful and cordially friendly, before they turned their attentions to Minos. "Hopefully this won't take long," the tiger-demon noted, smooth voice just edged with the hint of a feline purr. "I know each of us has things we would rather be doing, but I require some council on a rather serious matter." Extracting a single piece of common parchment from his files, he slid it across the table for the others to see. "Yesterday I received a missive from Balberith regarding the Records of Iscariot."

Pinpricks of concern fluttered at the back of Azrael's mind, his memory flashing immediately to a point in history that he would much rather have forgotten; a time filled with hatred and blood and fear. "Iscariot?" he questioned sharply, violet eyes narrowing as he looked at the document, scanning the lines of writing. "Why would Balberith contact you on such an archaic subject?"

Minos shook his head, clearly perplexed. "I don't know. Unless he's gone senile and suddenly thinks we're still living in that time—"

Azrael snorted, darkly bemused, knowing that Balberith – as the keeper of hell's records and the realm's official head scribe – was sharper than a flint and had all the likelihood of losing his sanity that a rock did.

"—we have no other option than to believe that His Majesty had the records pulled; which means that there's more interest being directed toward that particular portion of the past then we would like. His attention to such things, as well all know, has little potential for pleasantry."

Death and Taxes exchanged a grim look. Minos' murky eyes were alight with worry; a light that Azrael knew was mirrored in his own, because if Lucifer showed interest in anything, it was almost always tied to some delicately crafted excuse to wage war on God. The devil didn't pick up historical documents for light reading, after all. They didn't fear that their hellish king would overtake the mother of all things, because it was an unlikely result; Lucifer was incapable of taking on the Almighty, though he was definitely capable of holding his own against her.

The reason for the concern was that heaven's retribution against any potential attack would be slow to start due to politics. Wars lasted for long, copious amounts of time and quite often brutal, borderline apocalyptic setbacks ensued. There had been a total of three holy wars during the span of history and the majority of both realms did not yearn for a fourth. The angels didn't primarily care for warfare, despite the fact that half of their brithcause had been to serve as soldiers, and the demons merely wanted to be left alone to their own devices.

The sound of Mastema's voice caused the attention of the other two males to turn toward him, two pairs of eyes intent upon the hawk like face. "I do not think that His Infernal Majesty will be raising an army within the next week, if it comforts you."

Straightening his imposing length in the chair, he stretched briefly before reaching across the table and picking up the scrap of paper on which Balberith had scrawled his note to Minos requesting a thought on the subject of the infamous Iscariot mission. He examined the missive through the dark cloth, but let it flutter back down to the surface with a dismissive shrug, murmuring, "if Lucifer wishes to start another war, he will have to pay the price for it. There is nothing we can do but watch and wait. He has made the first move…that is all we know."

There was little Azrael could do but agree, and made his opinion clear by offering a word of assent.

Minos nodded shortly, gathering his papers and standing. His was a demanding and heavily important job, so it was no surprise that he moved to return to it so quickly. "Thank you for the council. Azrael," he turned to the angel, "I would ask you to address the Almighty about this, just in case it turns out as we fear—"

"I will as soon as I can," Azrael promised, making a mental note to address the assembly of heaven about the activity and watched as the disheartened judge left the meeting room, swift on his wide white paws.

With a sigh, he sank heavily back in his chair and closed his eyes. He lifted his hands to his temples and pressed, trying to ease the chaos in his head which made his entire body feel the pangs of restlessness. The signs had been ripe for signaling another snag between immortal relations. All the same he couldn't bear to think of the implications of such a bleak idea. God, if this meant another year of meetings and councils and pointless peace-talks, he'd never survive it. The last time something like this had happened, it had meant a whole year's absence from his charge, and who knew what sorts of horrible things could happen to Lilith while he was tied up in useless politics.

"You seem troubled," Mastema's tone was gently inquiring as he interrupted the younger immortal's thoughts. While it was true, Azrael had been created before the other entity they had aged quite differently; Azrael had remained in a more youthful state far longer than his birthing time would have implied. "There's a weight upon your soul…" Mastema paused, pondering; and then added, very slowly, as though he were measuring every word he used, "something to do with your Lady?"

"An arrow of a guess, as usual."

The dark-haired man's lips curved with a small smile. "Anguish in paradise? That is not, I think, what the Almighty had in mind when she gave you the gift she did."

"More of a confusion or frustration. I don't know what I'm supposed to do when Lilith refuses to acknowledge the familiarity she sees in my presence." Azrael frowned, touching a hand to his chest like he hoped the pressure would ward away a slice of pain. "She doesn't know what that _does_ to me."

Mastema considered this for a moment and spoke again, with a certainty that was not at all measured like before. "It sounds as though she might be trying to decide how she feels about you. If she was open with you verbally, then there is no problem with honesty, nor with physical contact if she allowed you close enough to touch. But that leaves her emotions."

The demon grew silent, a flicker of mild annoyance shimmering across his face when a small drop of black liquid seeped from beneath the cloth about his eyes to trail down his cheek. Discarding it with a swift removal of knots, he used the clean corner to wipe the mark from his face. He blinked several times to adjust his obsidian eyes to the light and swiped away yet another trail of black that dripped from between his lashes. Dutiful Mastema, cursed forever to bleed the black blood of Sorrow.

"As I was saying; from what I can see, your Lady is confused and most likely unaccustomed to honest affection. However, if you have made your move then you should allow her to make hers. I don't think it will take her long," he laughed lightly, a warm, pleasant ring in his earthy voice, "you made your point most vividly if my Sight serves correct."

Azrael smiled gently in return, yet it was short lived and quickly lost by pressing thoughts threaded with doubt. "Perhaps I should wait…with another disagreement coming into possibility—"

"Let _us_ handle the Dark King, Shinigami," Mastema chided gently, the wave of his hand broaching the realm of flippancy. "You have much more important matters to deal with. And I do hope you're successful, your constant state of dreariness is a wear on my sanity. Though affairs of the heart are hardly easy to cope with, I have confidence in you."

A small margin of the pressure coiling in his shoulders relaxed. It was as though no time had passed at all; they were still the elder and the student, the sage and the fool, and he by no means had forgotten the importance of such a friendship. "Thank you."

...

His rooms were just as he had left them; the book on the library desk still open to the page he had last idly turned to before departing for his daily escorting of deceased human souls. It was a volume of solar horoscopes, mostly useless but for the tracking of human patterns. Yet his interests in it had been, at the time, forged from hope.

Wanting to be comfortable, he meandered into the bedroom to change his clothes from his suit into a casual shirt and denim slacks of black and dark blue. The soft, well-loved fabrics embraced him like an old friend. While not quite up to his vanity's usual standard, they were enough to make him feel a little more at home.

He cast a long, lingering glance toward the small pile of files he had gathered for the meeting, noting the time that had been wasted in his effort to painstakingly locate each of the files serving as an argumentative point between himself and Minos. While he had anticipated an organized discussion, the topic that had been brought up had _not_ been one he had expected.

The Iscariot Mission: a once-time considered plot of the Royals and some of the high-born demons to corrupt the mind of a disciple of Jesus Christ. Despite the fact that Jesus' brief contact with Gabriel had only made him _think_ he was the son of heaven, the demonic agenda had planned to twist his natural process of thought and use the man to bring chaos to the mortal plain. Since Judas had already been placed so closely and ideally to the human who claimed to be God's messiah, the plan would have required only a small bit of influence to turn the mandates of Jesus into the words of the devil.

The mission's purpose had been to test the strength of the checks-and-balances system put into place to keep the hellish denizens from wreaking extensive havoc on earthly soil; but in the end, it had been disbanded. It was dropped due to the simple fact that it would have been a reasonable cause for the Almighty to trace and punish the demons responsible before a desirable state of chaos was reached.

Judas' mind had remained unscrambled; partly because of the demons' hesitation and partly for Azrael's subtle council that a move against even a false messiah would have been unwise. As Ambassador to the heavens and the only angel allowed through the gates of hell in times of peace, his opinion on the judgment and justice of God was measured prominently among the devil's advisors. It hadn't mattered in the end. A few hundred years later war had struck, laying waste to the Roman Empire.

Pale hands whipped the hair at his nape into a tidy ponytail before scooping up the pile of papers to redeliver them to their proper places in the library. He still contemplated the possible reasons for the pulling of the Iscariot records, but no matter which direction he pondered, the conclusions always remained the same. There was trouble brewing between the holy and unholy realms. And when the waters heated, a boiling state was never far away.

He nudged the library door open with the heel of one foot, pushing his way through the wooden barrier and out into the large, comfortable room that served as both his foyer and study, crossing to his writing desk. The folders he quickly sorted by name, paying scant attention to the contents as he set them on the flat space of shelf left empty on one of the numerous bookcases lining the walls. Mind dulled with the dread of warfare, he registered neither the words of the titles nor headlined issues, the words blurred by a focus unattached and distorted.

He glanced at the open book at the desk and found himself stricken by the cleanliness inspired by quiet guilt toward the abandoned volume. As he closed it, the dusky green covers slapped together with the rustle of vellum pages and a small puff of powdered elderberry.

Suddenly, from out of nowhere, a warning flare burned the base of his magical consciousness and his hand leapt to clutch at his heart as a sharp stab of pain bit into the deeper region of his chest. His brow furrowed to block the ache and, ignoring the dropped papers fluttering to the hardwood floor, seized a seeing globe from an open oaken drawer. The instant the crystal came into contact with his skin it awakened, filling itself with vision upon his intuitive command. Sparking with fire under the touch of his fingertips, it saw for him while he watched, searching for the source of the shrillest of warning chimes shrieking in his ears.

A small city park; the base of a fir tree upon the grass, white cloth torn from pale skin, the suffocating reek of alcohol and cigarettes, a woman's desperate scream. The fear in it ripped at his ears.

He dropped the crystal as though it had bitten him. Eyes wide and wild with panic, he whirled, lunged for the door and raced along the dark stone halls to the chamber that was his goal. It took him no more than an instant to locate the pedestal and bowl within the obsidian room, and with a single, frantic lurch he submersed his face into the liquid-filled basin. Darkness overcame him and he closed his eyes, preferring a self-induced black to one out of his control. The air tightened, pulling and grasping for an excuse to keep him back.

And then the pressure relaxed. The smells of late-autumn twilight embraced nostrils that flared in the hopes of catching a certain scent. He straightened, eyes snapping open to peer around in the early nighttime shadows, piercing the coveted, light-speckled dusk as he searched for what had so alarmed him.

The heart clenched within his chest when he found what he sought, tightening as though squeezed by a fist of iron. As he called upon his immortal speed to carry him near, he reached out, filling his hand with heavy, cotton cloth and pulling upward with the fury of protective energy. Red hazed his vision; his snarl of challenge coated with the coppery tang of blood that clashed brazenly with the sweet smell of lily, the soft, familiar scent tainted with the bitterness of fear.

_I shall turn their loins to dust._

No one abused what belonged to him.

_No one._


	9. A Place for the Lonely

**Chapter 11  
**A Place for the Lonely

Recommended Listening: "Heartache Every Moment" by H.I.M. and  
"Lily's Theme" by Alexandre Desplat [from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2]

* * *

"Shit—oh, _shit!_"

Lilith glanced away from the stage from which the part hip-hop part alternative punk startup band – teenagers from what she could tell – to regard her friend with a measure of alarm. Sarah cursed casually like most people did, but it was the vehemence of the words added with the controlled, tight-lipped panic with which the redhead stared down at the orange-cased cell phone cupped in her hands that called attention to her. Lilith hadn't heard the pealing notes of the message tone over the heavy bass of the band, but whatever it said, it wasn't good news.

Sarah reached for her purse and rummaged for cash. "It's Angela," she explained, "mom just texted me. Angie had a bad fall at practice—she's being taken to the ER."

Without a word, Lilith pooled her own contribution to Sarah's pile of bills to pay for her meal and drink, pressing the wad to the table and scooching from the booth where they had been seated. Sarah didn't need to say she had to go, Lilith knew she did. Angela was her little sister, and such a potentially serious soccer accident warranted a bit of panic. She shrugged into the lined sleeves of her peacoat, not bothering with the buttons, and tottered a little awkwardly toward the exit, hot on Sarah's heels as she helped her distracted friend don her jacket.

Sarah's little red truck was parked just off the curb; rockstar parking, as she called it. But when the redhead faltered, turning back to Lilith to offer her a ride home before she headed to the hospital, Lilith held up her hands.

"No way," she said firmly, "I'll take the bus. You go see your sister."

"Oh, honey, are you sure?"

Raising both brown eyebrows to look as stern as she could manage, Lilith repeated, "yes. Go."

The hug Sarah gave was sloppy; nowhere near her usual standard of rib-cracking affection, but that was understandable considering the circumstances. "Thanks, sweetie. I owe you another date, ok?"

"You're on." Lilith waved her into the truck. "Call me later? I want to know Angie's ok."

"Sure. Bye, hon."

As the truck sped out into traffic, headed determinedly in the direction of the urgent care center, Lilith turned and headed for the bus stop, sending her friend's sweet, brash little sister hopeful wishes as she walked. But the accident was only to be the opening act of what was to be a downward spiraling series, it seemed. As fast as she managed to wobble her way down the sidewalk, even as she dared to attempt a feeble jog to speed her way, the bus took no notice of her waving and calling. The driver steered it away, leaving her at the curb, shivering.

She mourned her lack of fortune. It was just her luck to miss the 11:00 bus, the last bus of the night. And while she clutched the pole which pointed up at the sky to shine light down upon her chosen spot, she knew that griping about it wouldn't change anything. She could have called a cab, but they were expensive, and she had already blown enough money on the darned dress ruffled with lace fringe about her legs. She would walk.

Perhaps out of spite to the ideas of public transportation, she lifted her nose to the rear lights of the bus, now pulling farther and farther away into the distance before it turned out of sight and headed north. She knew very well it wasn't the best idea in the world, but she knew the way and knew that so long as she kept out of the alleys, she would be fine.

She tipped her head back, reaching up to pull her hair from the half-ponytail. The sky was a heartbreaking shade of cobalt blue, blotched with the wispy clouds of a late-autumn night, though that was probably the affect of smog rather than actual clouds. Though chilly, it was a nice night. And it was dry, a near miracle for Seattle, arguably the wettest place in the continental United States.

The heels of her shoes made conspicuous little clicking sounds against the cement with every step she made. While it was a little annoying at first, after a while she hardly noticed. She could still feel a lingering edge of loneliness prodding insistently toward the rear of her emotional valley, and wondered why her time with Sarah (called short as it had been) hadn't vanquished it. There was no real reason for her to be stuck in such a rut, and it was starting to worry her.

She crossed an empty street, making an effort to pass beneath a street light's warm halo of a glow, and paused mid-step when the lilt of voices reached her ear. It was coming from the cluster of trees and bushes that served as an inter-city mini-park, a piece of nature that had been inserted into a corner backed by buildings as a polite bow to the up-and-coming Green movement. As she edged cautiously forward she caught a glimpse of four people lounging around by one of the benches settled between the low hanging branches of two large fir trees.

They were men, unlikely any older than thirty at most, laughing and jeering with one another in the way good friends tended to do. Paranoia tickled at the back of her mind, making her want to turn around and go the long way home, but, perhaps against her better judgment, she let her pride get the better of her, lifting her chin and striding bravely (or foolishly) onward. They were just people. There was no rule to dictate that all strangers must be bad.

It took a few moments for them to notice her; they were so absorbed in their own raucous conversation. But she felt the slide of their eyes as a flush of uncomfortable heat when they did. She valiantly ignored them, keeping her eyes pointedly forward while she drew close enough to pass the bench, but in the end, it really didn't do her any good. She was willing to admit her foolishness the moment an uncomfortable twinge alerted her to the steps mirroring her own.

"Hello there, pretty lady," one called, the muffled snicker of one of his comrades snagging the end of the greeting. She continued on, her steps instinctively quickening against the backdrop of heavier footfalls, pretending to believe that she wasn't being followed.

A large, faintly greasy hand encircled her arm, pulling her around as the same speaker noted, "it's rude to ignore someone talking to you."

Lilith could feel her heart-rate climbing, could feel the fear curdling frigidly in her veins while she stared up at the dark-haired man, at his stubble-shadowed cheeks and the cigarette that he absently flicked to the pavement. Then her focus shifted to the black, pitiless eyes. His irises resembled the cold, hard surfaces of sharpened stone, empty and void. Yet it hadn't been a smart move, meeting those eyes. Like a dog, he seemed to smell the fear rolling from her in potent waves, and locking gazes just added to the emphasis.

She glanced quickly away when he grinned, taken with dark amusement. "S-sorry," she could have cursed herself for the stutter, "but I'm in a hurry—"

"Really?" This came from one of the others, a slim, borderline gangling man that came up to sling an arm over his comrade's shoulder, leaning on the dark-haired ringleader and directing a passive leer in her direction.

"Yes, I—I really need to go," Lilith stepped back, insides writhing, away from the touch of the dark-haired man who had so frightened her. But apparently he didn't plan on letting her off so easily. His grip tightened, shifting with quick fingers to grab handful of her jacket.

Fear spiked into panic. She bolted like a startled deer, yanking her arms from the confines of the garment and darting off toward the trees as fast as her heels would allow. Why toward the seclusion of shade and not toward the city center and people, she would probably never understand. But it wasn't nearly fast enough – _she_ wasn't fast enough. Her tottering gait allowed her to reach the very edge of the trees, just reaching the base of a large fir before she was intercepted by yet another body. The yelp which was ripped from her throat crushed her breath into silence, her wobbly feet reeling with alarm when she was grabbed and tossed backward into a pair of arms that wrapped around her torso in a grip meant to restrain.

If there was anything in this world that frightened her, it was the prospect of being restrained, caged. That, however, was nothing to her fear of abuse. She thrashed like a wild animal, or as well as she could because it was difficult to thrash when being half-hog-tied by another person's limbs. Beside herself with terror driven by paranoia and instinct, she struggled on; unable to comprehend why she couldn't get free.

The figure who had her pinned by the arms cursed, sidestepping quickly in an attempt to recover his balance, but he failed and fell to the ground, dragging her down with him. She writhed like an angry cat, flailing to right herself amidst the disorientation of the world blurring around her; and she cried out when a second of the group reached to yank her roughly onto her back.

The bite of the grass blades into the skin of her arms and back was nothing to the press of the cold, hard earth. As his weight bore down on her, each of her ribs ached beneath the harsh tear of her breath. Her eyes widened when she blinked up into the unshaven face of the dark-haired man who had entreated her with words and realized why she feared him so immediately; an element to those dark, empty eyes that reminded her of someone. Kevin, who had tried to kill her.

She pushed at him, a whimper lodging inside her throat while her attacker's hands gripped her by the shoulders and forced her down. The next instinct was to lash out with her legs and try to kick him. This proved futile as well, for although she managed to clip him in the side he promptly wedged them between his thighs and sat on them. Her ankle bent harshly to the side, the strap of her shoe cutting into the flesh, and something inside her foot gave a subdued snap.

It _hurt_.

She cried out, the strain in her voice high and choked with fear and a resentful fury. Aiming for his face and eyes she clawed at him as though hoping he might give up and let go, but he fumbled for her wrists. Her frantic attempts to scratch him sightless were easily restrained. The blood in her veins ran cold when he leant down to murmur: "don't be like that, honey. Just calm down and this won't have to hurt a bit."

His free hand was warm against her ribs as it traced up the line of her waist, sinister with greed, but not in a nice way, as warmth might have implied. She had never been touched so boldly before. And she didn't care what her girls' ridiculous books claimed; there was nothing thrilling about this. It was crass and it was wrong, and she didn't want anything to do with it.

In that instant she could have cursed Sarah to hell and back for the low-cut, short-skirted dress and its frothy, thin fabric. She may as well have been walking home naked for all the good the stupid thing had done her. Yet for all her terror she could reason enough to be defiant to such treatment.

She opened her mouth, set on making as much noise as she could – not necessarily in the hopes of being heard and assisted, but at least to make it harder for them to concentrate. A nasty curse reached her ears and another man's hand was clapped over her mouth. The fingers smelled of motor oil and chalk; but instead of gagging she managed to bite down hard with sharp little teeth, screaming as loudly as she could, when the flesh was snatched away with a shout. The sound ripped at her lungs and throat, but it was loud and piercing, which made her feel a small flare of victory.

The grip at her captive wrists jerked, yanking her arms upward and back. Her shoulders crackled with pain from the bad angle and her screams splintered into a faint whimper.

There were fingers on her leg – belonging to a second face, looming out of the night above her – fumbling with the skirt of her dress. Blunt nails scraped her skin raw. Another hand found her neckline garment, showing no tenderness as it groped at her. She thrashed again, shoving her knee into her captor's stomach.

The ringleader growled his irritation. Clearly having had enough of her arguments, he drew back his hand and sent it stinging across her face, not at all gently. Her skin flamed, the throb in her jaw sending tears springing to her eyes as he man hissed, "stop struggling and be a good girl." He pressed his mouth to hers, breath rank with the taste of cigarettes and the bitter tang of fresh alcohol. He pawed one-handed at the hem of her dress, hastily baring her thighs as he bruised her lips blue with his biting teeth and tearing the side seam of the white fabric.

"Would you hurry up?" Someone (one of the pair not currently assaulting her, she assumed) hissed, nudging her primary captor with a toe. "I'm getting hard just looking at her—"

"Yeah," another butted in, his eyes overly bright as he filled his eyes with unwilling female flesh. "Sharing's nice."

The dark-haired man pulled away, freeing her mouth to snarl, "shut up and wait your turn," while Lilith gasped for air, spluttering and crying. She couldn't stop the tears that finally began to slip from between her eyelids. As much as she wanted to refuse them the satisfaction, when he turned back to her, pitiless teeth biting roughly at the delicate skin of her throat, she just couldn't keep the devastation at bay.

Her limbs were heavy, her small body weary from the furious struggles. She didn't think she could fight anymore and she cried, her tears hot and salty trails shining upon her skin, her abuser's sound of pleasure a harsh rumble deep in his chest as he licked the liquid from her face.

Disgusted, Lilith wrenched her face away. She squeezed her eyes shut trying to think of somewhere, anywhere else. So long as the place she found was somewhere she could feel safe and clean and warm, away from these brutes and their dirty hands, she wouldn't care where it was. As long as she could get away from the filthy feeling of being soiled, the creeping horror of the hands grasping at her flesh, away from the hurt of her torso as he crushed his body into hers, painfully hard. Maybe she could make herself forget.

Forget…how would she _ever_ forget?

Suddenly the weight atop her grunted, deep and low with pain as though he had been sucker-punched, and then he was wrenched away, an insect plucked from a leaf. She coughed, her lungs filling with air as the pressure was lifted from her aching ribs. Blinking back her tears, she sat up, the blood rushing to her head enough to make her dizzy, peering across the plot of grass and beneath the limbs of several trees to fix her eyes upon the whirl of motion taking place in front of her.

At the edge of the sidewalk, just underneath the faint flicker of a street lamp, three of her attackers were locked in vicious tussle with a figure of white, blue and black. A figure she knew from nothing but the gleam of his pale hair. Her guardian, once again leaping valiantly to her rescue – a pattern which she didn't find so tiresome just now.

The angel whirled with a balanced ease as he met each and every startled punch thrown his way. His elegant face was cold with indifference when one of the mortal men fell, knocked unconscious, to an easy pivoted kick to the forehead. Another followed, dropping as the angel's hand slammed into the side of his neck, shutting down the nerves that enabled the body to move. As the third charged him with a yell, the angel stepped out of the way and let his fingers close around the human's unprotected throat.

Conveniently ignoring the fact that the mortal male was actually sizably larger than he, Azrael lifted him off his feet with effortless, unimpressed annoyance, strong tendons flexing to half-crush the fragile windpipe before tossing him to the grass. The human coughed, breathless and shocked, and fled as soon as he was able to haul himself from the ground. Not a glance was spared toward the impossible strength that had whipped him so thoroughly.

Wide green eyes followed the blur of activity with nothing short of awe, not knowing that her mouth hung open like a child's while she watched her guardian's body twist and shift with a ghostlike agility. The strength of him shimmered, sleek and graceful, his steps calmly measured to artfully batter them into place. It was impossible to look away. It was impossible to avoid the utter entrancement of such terrible, wrathful beauty.

When she was grabbed by the elbow and jerked to her unsteady feet, she realized that she had briefly forgotten about the dark-haired man. A startled shriek came unbidden to her mouth despite herself. Cold metal pressed into her shoulder, strangely frigid in contrast to the sweaty clutch of the hand squeezing the life out of her left forearm. The sound had barely left her mouth before Azrael's attention snapped to her, his shoulders tense…and froze in his tracks as the wild-eyed man pointed the barrel of a pistol straight at him.

"Off with you."

Lilith suppressed a shudder; the man's voice was eerily pleasant when he addressed the angel, jerking his gun briefly in a gesture meant to echo _go__away._ But Azrael lifted a single golden eyebrow before taking a slow step toward the two humans standing sheltered beneath the tree. When the angel's eyes flickered to rest upon her face, she saw the vivid darkness there soften to a gentle violet.

"Hey!" Her attacker snapped, his grip around Lilith's arm tightening to a level that elicited a squeak of pain, and growled, "I told you to _leave,_ asshole. I'm not afraid to shoot you—"

"Then do it."

A shiver of strange delight warmed her insides as the dare flew from the angel's lips. She actually had to force her eyes away from the line of his mouth to keep herself from sighing in a way that she refused to analyze.

Azrael stepped closer still, his pace steady, undaunted by the silhouette of the gun pointed at him. In fact, he didn't seem to care that he was staring a weapon in the face.

Without warning, the pistol exploded, firing with a crack that seemed to shatter her eardrum. Ears buzzing, her eyes darted to her would-be protector, stricken by her horror, because as fast as he was, there was no way he could have dodged a bullet. And yet, unfazed and unruffled, Azrael merely continued forward with nothing but a small hole in his shirt front to serve as any indication that the shooter had possessed any aim to speak of. She stared, stunned, at the hole situated smack in the right side of his chest.

"You mortals and your guns," he mused, the tone bone dry as he drew within mere meters of where the mortal man stood, looking down at his gun in something close to frenzied disbelief. The angel stopped, piercing gaze pinning the human to the spot.

The sharp rip of cloth preceded them, but the brilliant, beautiful wings that burst from his shoulder blades to fold elegantly behind his back were as lovely and terrible as they had been the first time she had witnessed them. Clean white feathers caught and held the lamplight, the sheen tracing silver threads across their pristine surfaces and making the blackened tips seem singed with obsidian.

"I suggest that you release her," Azrael murmured, addressing the gunman's expression of white terror. The man needed no further persuasion. Tossing Lilith aside, he darted away, tearing through the trees and stumbling in his haste, leaving behind nothing but the sour stink of a sinner's guilt.

Relief was a drug to send her reeling and Lilith sank weakly to unsteady knees, rubbing her sore wrists. A deep breath helped to calm the still quite frantic beat of her heart as her blood slowly cooled from the pitch of terror, and she sighed. She had resigned herself to the inevitability of her fate. They would have raped and then probably killed her had it not been for that timely intervention…and she had thought his haunting to be annoying. Whatever else he had saved her from before; nothing had been so close to slaughtering what was left of her. It would have killed something inside her, she was certain. But he had come; he had made them stop.

A gentle hand touched her shoulder and she looked up in time to see her guardian sink into a smooth crouch beside her, his eyes a shade of lilac that was pale with concern as they gazed into hers. "Are you all right?"

She smiled a little shakily as she peered up at him, feeling as small and fragile as a little girl next to the regal, imposing figure. "Thanks to you."

An elegant mouth returned her smile, his relief in regards to her confirmation a softening of the way he held his shoulders. He examined her for bruises, taking stock of the purpling marks at her wrists, elbow and the base of her neck, his eyes flickering downward to gage the extent of the harm that had come to her. On they traveled, venturing past the nasty set of teeth impressions at her collarbone (which he regarded with narrowed eyes and a careful touch of a fingertip), coming to the plunging neckline of the dress.

He stilled, hand frozen mid-shift from neck to shoulder. His eyes flushed with color as he shifted from the analysis of her injury to the state of her clothing, or what little of it there was to bare arms and shoulders. The low neckline and high hem alone exposed enough skin to make her feel cheap and put a slow, burning warmth in her cheeks.

She shifted under a tinge of discomfort, but it was different from her fearful loathing she had held for the looks from the men who had tried to hurt her. Under _his_ eyes, it was a gentle tingling through her nerves; an electric current that seemed to increase in potency the closer he came to her. Now, however, the connection no longer caused an immediate fright. The familiarity of his presence was impossible to overlook now, and yet while she recognized it, she knew it wasn't quite the same.

There was something different about the way she regarded his aristocratic beauty and piercing eyes; something that was no longer stained black with distrust, but blushed instead with curious fascination. She had never been so relaxed around him, and she had to wonder if it was because of the harsh reminder of what harmful intent truly looked like. Evil did not wear a face that wanted to kiss her.

He cleared his throat and got to his feet, the movement quite smooth despite it swiftness. She blinked up at him, startled by the sudden withdrawal, realizing that she had actually managed to ruffle him.

"I should go…" He muttered, more to himself than to her, eyes dark as they slid guiltily from the line of her legs. A tense, lengthy moment passed, during which the angel seemed torn with the indecision between staying and possibly inadvertently pressuring her or leaving. It didn't linger. In another moment he turned and began to walk away.

"Wait—"

Lilith pulled herself upright, using the tree as a support to stand unsteadily on her heeled feet, and wondered how on earth she had mustered the gall to yell after him. He paused, his back to her. There were two neat tears in the shirt above his shoulder blades where the wings had split through the fabric, and beneath those rips she caught a glimpse of several thin, scrolling black lines, etched against the skin of his back. They looked like tattoos, as though his wings marked his flesh even when tucked away.

"I…" She gulped, unsure of what she was trying to say.

He glanced back at her over one shoulder, an inquiring edge to his face. With her eyes she traced the sharp angles of his cheekbones and nose, the strong curves of his arm muscles, the way the dark jeans clung to his long, powerful legs. His hair was escaping its neat ponytail, feathery tendrils of white-blond framed his cheeks and chin like soft streaks of gold.

At the back of her mind she knew very well that her staring was impolite, but knowing this didn't seem to have the power to make her eyes move. She just couldn't seem to help it. Touched by the dappled night light, both natural and mechanical from between the trees, bathed in the warm glow of his own divinity, he was like a flame…and she was the stupid moth with the death-wish.

His head tilted to one side, prompting with a soft, "Yes?" He regarded her with a steady kind of patience, expression carefully arranged into one of the utmost unthreatening calm. While he was pleasantly surprised that she had called him back, he was hesitant to get too close just yet; hesitant to let her see the face that he hid away from the world. It was a face that was pained by her distance, that feared rejection…that wanted to press her back to the ground and do things that made his better sense frown, scandalized and shameful.

Yet that was not her fault. It wasn't her intention to be so alluring. He didn't know what she wanted, but he _did_know that the way she looked at him was doing nothing to help avoid the thirst scraping at his throat, or the craving embedded deep within his own hungry heart. She couldn't keep that pretty, doe-eyed stare on him and expect him to stay sane.

The reaction she had to one simple word shook Lilith to the core. His voice had been gentle, but the sound had held a note that struck something inside her, scraped it raw. It had been husky, roughened, like a piece of velvet stroked the wrong way and yearning to be smoothed…and for some unknown reason, she reacted.

She lifted her chin a fraction of an inch to meet his eyes – green clashing with a lavender that coiled to something darker. Her voice came as though from far away, but the message carried there was very clear. "I'm—asking you…"

He did nothing but stare at first, appearing not to have heard. But after a heart-stopping moment he turned to face her, tension pulling at every line of his body. "_What_–did you say?" he breathed; his eyes bright and intent upon her face.

Her eyes strayed from his, shy despite the request she had given, clutching at the rough bark of the tree with fingers that trembled. "Azrael," she whispered, the name rolling off her tongue as though she were tasting something sweetly-flavored and delicious. "I'm asking you."

It was as if the sound of his name on her lips had roused him from a trance.

The angel was at her side before she had even finished speaking, gazing down at her with fierce, terrible longing etched into every plain of his face. "Are you sure?" His hand shook when he hesitantly touched her cheek, trembling with the effort it took to keep any sort of distance between them, retaining a firm hold on the reins of impulse to make certain that he had understood her entreaty and hadn't just invented it out of sheer desperation.

The question itself was enough incentive for her. Had he been any other man he might have pressed forward without having the decency to make sure she was in her right mind, that she knew what she was offering. And perhaps she was suffering a bit of post-traumatic stress and really just wanted to be comforted. Perhaps her brain had been addled and she was seeing stars where there should have been warning sirens. It made no difference. She let her answer fall without another thought.

"Yes."

Azrael shifted to cup her cheek in his warm palm, the touch softer than a caress as he tilted her face upward. His eyes locked with hers, searching, seeking something that eluded him. Emotion after emotion flickered across his features, surprise and incredulity, uncertainty, awe. And then, quite suddenly, the myriad of feelings melted into a singular glow of pure delight.

There was trust in her eyes; honest and shy. She _trusted_him, despite all her older fears and suspicions and questions, despite his lack of human blood, despite her recent scare. For the moment, at least, none of that seemed to matter. The knowledge of her trust made the heart within his chest ache with a want for that trust deeper and sharper than he had ever felt before. Almost against his own conscious will he leaned forward, eyes flickering from the green of her irises to focus infinitesimally lower at the pale pink curve of her mouth.

Despite having asked, Lilith couldn't quite fight back the slight spark of anxiousness that arose upon seeing the glimmer in his eyes. She very deliberately ignored it. Just how many times had he come to her aid when she was in need? She would probably never know the real number. How long had he given her protection, watched over her, helped her? When had he ever denied her an answer to a question? When had he ever raised a hand to harm her? The very _least_ she could do was shove away her own silly fears for once.

In truth, she had no thoughts of panic once Azrael's lips touched her own. There simply wasn't any room for them.

The breath hitched in her throat, the flutter of her heart beat so rapid that it almost hurt her. The distance between them had closed so quickly that she hadn't had the time to second-guess her consent, and she supposed she deserved to be surprised. Considering how much of a petrified little freak she was, he was bound to deem it better to hurry, steal his kiss as quickly as possible while she was still under the influence of shock.

Yet knowing this didn't take away any of the sweet, tingling warmth that blossomed from his skin and poured into her. Her face burned, her focus pinned with unnatural awareness to the soft contact of his hand, the gentle pressure of his mouth. Captivating as it was, she could feel the stiffness to his touch. There was a strictly guarded control there guiding him to do no more than he initially dared.

It was over before she had caught up with him, and she was a little alarmed by how sorry she was. Then again, wasn't kissing supposed to be enjoyable? Why else would people do it?

A sudden pain ripped through her left ankle when she shifted on her heels and she cried out, both surprised and hurt. He pulled quickly away, his eyes streaked with gray. "What is it?" he questioned, concern flavoring a voice hinted with the aftertaste of desire, "Did I—?"

"No," she interrupted hurriedly from between breathless inhales. "It's my ankle. It just started hurting—"

Without another word he adjusted his grip around her waist and set her lightly on the grass so she could stretch out her legs. He gestured to her feet, inquiring politely, "May I?" She nodded, and he took tender hold of her lower leg, the one without a throbbing ankle.

His hands, though large, were slender and articulate, navigating the straps that held the shoe to her foot with deftly handled speed. He set the black, heeled monstrosity aside, where it nestled in the grass. Repeating the process more slowly with the other leg, he took the time to avoid jostling the sore ankle as he slid the second shoe from her foot, eyes trained to his task with the utmost care. It was wonderfully more comfortable, getting out of those darned heels. If feet could breathe, hers were doing so much more easily.

His fingers traced the intents of the bones in her feet, brushing her skin with a narrowed, determined focus. He pressed a bit more firmly just inside her arch and a hot spark of pain jolted all the way up to her knee, snapping like lightning inside her bones. She whimpered, automatically trying to pull her foot out of his grasp, and his eyes darkened with a steely sheen of anger. "Broken tarsal—the bastards."

That brought a quavering smile to Lilith's lips, an involuntary laugh surfacing from her throat. The glance he shot her was questioning. "Sorry, it's funny to hear an angel curse."

His answering smile was a little wry. On the one hand, it was nice to hear her admit that she knew what he was, and to accept it. On the other, it brought him uncomfortably close to the troubles he had in dealing with his origins and past. "You are forgetting that the creatures of heaven are not exactly as described by the Bible, Sweetling."

"Still…" She averted her eyes, blushing for the sake of the pet name he had chosen and touching a finger to lips that still retained a soft tingle.

Never in her short intimate span had she been touched like that. Kevin had never kissed her in such a manner, not that she would have let him; he had preferred to try and shove his tongue down her throat, not use it to make her swoon. And yet she couldn't understand what had possessed her to lead Azrael on like that. She was almost disturbed by it, how she had wanted him to hold her so tightly, wanted him to kiss her the way all those moronic romantic movies depicted…it was purely out of character. But she wasn't allowed the time to dwell on it.

When he scooped her up, one arm tucked beneath her legs (shoes dangling from his fingers) and the other circled around her back to cradle her against his chest as he stood, she forgot her trepidation in favor of pointedly avoiding looking at the ground lurching so far beneath her. Instead, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and clung for support. "What are you doing?" she squeaked, crushing herself into the sturdy bones of beneath his collar.

He headed for the sidewalk, carrying her as easily and gracefully as if she weighed nothing at all while he strode casually northeast. "Taking you home, of course," he answered. "Flying would be faster, but I know you aren't fond of heights."

But of _course_.

Unable to restrain herself, she laughed out loud. The fading stress coupled with the relief of knowing that she was safe now, with him, resulted in gales of unrestrained laughter that had her gasping for breath, tears of mirth at the corners of her eyes. Amused, he smiled as he carried his precious cargo through the lamp-lit streets. Her laughter was addictive, and far more beautiful than the conflicted nervousness she had shown him so often before.

Within minutes, he was setting her down on the couch in her living room and kneeling in front of her, voice quiet as he said, "now, I'm not exactly an expert on healing, but I think I can handle a broken bone. Is it all right if I touch you? I need to see if the force that broke the bone caused harm to any other tendons or ligaments." Lilith complied without question, nodding her assent as he reached for her knee.

He slid his hand beneath the joint, gently bending so she held her leg straight at about the level of his ribcage, which he angled toward. The other he lay over her aching foot and closed his violet eyes.

With morbid fascination she watched as his fingers slowly began to trail up the length of her leg. The soft, creeping touch caused a delicious kind of lurch in her stomach more vibrant than simple butterflies. The places their skin touched burning with a kind of liquid, invisible fire painted by the slide of his fingertips. Some traitorous part of her almost hoped that he would never stop, and it grew inside her mind until the thought almost choked her and she could barely breathe because of it.

But (to her shame and relief) he did stop, just before he came in contact with the torn, frothy hem of her dress and he discreetly returned his hand to her ankle. The area warmed below his palm, rapidly enough to make her wonder whether he was shoving the heat through her flesh, and she could have sworn she saw a tendril of violet lick at her skin from beneath the cup of his fingers. That was before the sharp crack and the splintering of pain.

She winced, her foot jerking in reflex to the hurt that was already fading. Azrael's face contorted with annoyance and he hissed a string of curses in what sounded like Latin or Greek. "Forgive me," he murmured to her, "I told you I'm not the best—but never mind. It's healed now." The pain had gone by then, surely he must have known…nevertheless, he carried her ankle to his mouth and brushed an apologetic kiss over the offended area. Lilith blushed, a stark and vivid pink, thoroughly embarrassed, but said nothing even when he moved to sit beside her on the couch.

Suddenly she felt uncomfortable. The moment quickly turned awkward when she found she had nothing to say, and she stood uncertainly, shamed by how rude she was being. "Um, are you hungry? Can I get you something to eat or drink? _Do_angels eat or drink?" She forced a laugh at her unintentional faux pas, looking anywhere but at him.

"We can if we wish, but it isn't necessary for our survival."

"Oh…all right then." She made to sit back down, but in her anxiety she tripped over his feet and promptly tumbled right into his lap. Flustered, face aflame and nearly beside herself with embarrassment, she hurriedly apologized for her clumsiness and scrambled to get out of his space.

But she couldn't. He had wrapped one powerful arm about her waist and pinned her snugly in place.

"No need to apologize," Azrael assured her graciously.

She shifted uneasily, though she wasn't quite sure whether that discomfort was from being so close to the steady warmth of his body or the knowledge that she had actually asked him to kiss her just moments ago. Did it even matter?

"I was wondering—" She paused, plucking up the courage to ask him the question that had been plaguing her since the day he'd told her what he was. She wasn't certain she had the words to form the right inquiry, but she might as well try. "When you…took care of Kevin, you said you'd been watching me. I wondered if—" Lip pinned between her teeth; she struggled to find a way to describe her thoughts without coming across as rude or vindictive and drew a complete blank.

"You wondered if you had a heavenly stalker?" He finished the question for her without a single trace of mocking or teasing to mar the light alto timbre of his voice, and she knew he had probably known all along. "In a way, I suppose. I _have_hardly let you out of my sight since you were fourteen; I suppose that counts as stalking. But I don't regret it." He laid his cheek against hers. It was a sweet, affectionate gesture that drew her closer into the warmth of his relaxed embrace. She didn't pull away from him, and so he added, "I don't regret my human heart."

In time with the pace of her frantic heart, her breath quickened when she felt him brush a light kiss against the slope of her cheek, his firm lips tender and smooth. Allowing it was surely some sign of vulnerability, yet she really didn't seem to mind. Why should she? It was a little forward, but he was showing her respect with gentleness; any rend in her feeling of security was only there as a result of the affection he showed her.

She hadn't expected to see him appear, not after she had denied him contact before. She had resigned herself to her fate, certain that she was on her own, because why would he risk his own safety for her when he would get nothing in return? Clearly his life was in little jeopardy when it came to the petty threats mere mortals could offer, but that didn't make her any less endeared to him for what he had done for her. The truth was; she wouldn't have blamed him for leaving her to suffer.

Whatever thoughts of annoyance she had molded out of his gift of protection had been crushed into dust. She had realized that he wasn't going to be some kind of fair-weather friend. He wouldn't retract his gift of shelter for a trivial thing such as pride.

While she supposed that technically she had known him for most of her life, since he claimed to be her guardian, somehow despite having only really _known_who he was for a few days, she felt safer with him than she often did by herself. Maybe some would have called that foolish. Having him at her back didn't frighten her like it would have had he been anyone else. Without the tinny shriek of alarm from her paranoia, there seemed no logical reason to be afraid.

Of course, that didn't mean she wasn't. Just a little.

"I used to think that I wanted to be like the others—like Uriel or Gabriel—without the ability to feel like a human does. I used to think it was a flaw, some kind of curse. That was before I found you." The grip about her waist tightened, his palm flattening against her side, curving close to the shape of her figure and pressing her into his torso. "That was before I learned this kind of love is so much more than a simple, physical kind; that it's something deeper, truer, a desire beyond anything any of my kindred have ever known…"

The words faded into silence. Then there was nothing but his breath, a warm, feather-light touch on her neck and driving her utterly mad. Her stomach twisted within her belly as he spoke to her again; a question this time, his tone husky and just slightly cautious. "May I kiss you again?"

He seemed uneasy, like he was afraid that he was pushing her too hard or too quickly. And while she felt apprehensive about their relationship, if that was an appropriate term, she couldn't deny that her heart had leapt with a delightful anticipation. She wanted him to kiss her again. She _wanted_ to feel his skin against hers. That was what did her in; that and knowing she would regret it if she denied him. Perhaps that was why he had been so careful before, because he had been trying to prove that he could show restraint, that he wouldn't hurt her.

Her answer was a single nod that ended just before he pressed his lips to the tender curve of her neck.

She started, unable to contain the jolt when something like a heated chill raced along her spine; heightened surprise in response to the touch to skin that had never been so sensitive before that moment. His fingers brushed her hair back from the area below her jaw, leaving searing trails upon the flesh in their wake as he touched her chin and turned her face toward him. Sliding from her burning cheek that hand shifted to cradle the back of her neck while her noise of surprise was effortlessly silenced by the crush of his lips.

There was a fire in his touch this time, a hunger driven by raw, unbridled feeling. It was very different from the brief, almost cold gesture he had given her earlier, yet despite the generous pour of passion, there was no harshness to him, no force. There was a loving tenderness to the touch as he gently coaxed her into letting her lips part for him.

A gasp shuddered up her throat when she felt his tongue caress the edge of her lower lip, a soft stroke of warmth and comfort that stirred a surprisingly pleasant shiver. It coursed up and down the length of her body like a chill without the grip of ice. Melting beneath the heat that slipped down her throat with all the ease of a sip of hot liquid, she closed her eyes and lost herself in the swirl of affection.

Azrael could almost feel his heart swelling, fit to burst with the pleasure of Lilith's acceptance him without so much as a shred of protest. It was nothing like he had ever felt before nor anything he had ever dared to imagine. The needing pulse of desire that had so desperately wanted to be quelled by the touch was anything but subdued. Instead of fading, the obsessive thirst flared brighter than ever before; the simple rush of her harried breath against his lips was a fan to the fire as he drank the taste of her.

Yet while one small sliver of his conscious mind gave a sigh of relief, he was also very aware of just how much more complicated this little treasure of a moment would make things. He knew that there was nothing in the world that could tear her away from him now. Not now, when he could feel the soft warmth of her desire beginning to mirror his own; not now after nineteen years of watching, not after five of agony while he grappled with the bestial, impulsive cravings that had threatened to rend him to pieces.

But this was a moment of weakness on her part, and he knew better than to believe that she would truly be so quick to let him love her. Even thus, there was no reason for him not to take advantage of such open permission.

She couldn't recall ever feeling so very powerless, not of her own consent. Her eyes flickered open, then closed, her hands limp at her sides as she numbly tried to process the jumble of emotions and feelings cramming her brain and roiling beneath her breastbone. The feeling was utterly consuming that she hardly noticed when his grip about her changed. Her hips merely twisted to accommodate him as he guided her backward until she was propped against the padded arm of the couch.

Her skin felt flushed and overheated; as though she had been running for hours and even the short, ripped dress she wore were several layers too thick. Squirming, her once carefully crossed legs shifted in an unconscious attempt to cool down. But she froze, stiffening with surprise when Azrael's knee slipped between them, denim-clad leg pressing between her thighs.

His doting mouth brushed the curve of her jaw; and somehow the touch soothed the disorienting ache that burned within her blood and ached within her bones. When he caught her mouth for the third time, it pulled a skip from her heartbeat and drove a spear of warmth through her chest.

Lilith noted the anxious quiver of her lips, painfully aware of her own bewilderment. She didn't know what to do. Should she touch him? Should she mimic him? Should she even move at all? She hadn't asked for this…but did she actually care? Her brain was too scattered with information and sensation to register whether she was disturbed by what was happening.

He was a lot stronger than he looked. While his figure seemed almost slim beneath his clothing, he was built with a lithe, contained kind of power. His skin smelled faintly of soap, cinnamon, and something that was pleasant and darkly musky. He had shaved recently, if he even had to at all, for his cheeks and chin were smooth.

Curiosity struck, uninvited, uncontrolled, and she was powerless to stop it. Her hands rose, gathering the fabric of the simple sleeveless shirt until her adventurous fingers tucked beneath the black cotton.

The gently defined muscles beneath his skin shifted in response to her touch. He jerked slightly as if startled, but made no move to stop her while she gingerly explored the powerful curves of his stomach with trembling fingers. In fact, freed by her boldness, his hands moved. They had remained strictly controlled, confined by his will to her waist and the nape of her neck; after all, he had asked for a kiss, not a physical examination. Yet how could he resist the beckon of her touch?

She shivered when his fingertips slowly traced the curve of her side to pause at her hip. Somewhere in a back corner of her mind she noted that his other hand had slid beneath one of her knees, widening the gap between them so that he could move closer. The firm slope of his thigh was warm and solid between her legs.

She couldn't breathe. Her throat had locked, her lungs fit to burst from lack of oxygen. And as if he knew, as if he could sense her thirst, he released her, allowing her access to precious air.

Her inhale was deep and shaky, a shallow breath to fill her lungs while she tried to calm the race of her heart out of embarrassment and shock. It was difficult to process that she was being touched this way, as though she were cherished and worshipped. He didn't make her feel that she was simply a tool with which to burn out a simple physical lust, but that didn't explain why her instinctual paranoia hadn't sent her cowering.

Why wasn't she finding this disgusting like she should have been?

When her breath stopped for the second time, it was because he had gently tugged her lower lip between his teeth. The rather small and probably thoughtless movement sent a frigidly hot shock through her system, liquefying her insides, and her hands slid upwards on pure reflex; causing her palms to softly cup the curved muscles that built his chest.

A liquid shudder rippled through him just as his body went stiff. For a horrible second she was afraid she had done something wrong, but not a moment later he pressed even closer, seizing back control of her mouth with a possessive energy that nearly literally stole her breath away.

His powerful hands found the ripped hem of her dress and slowly, carefully slid the lacy fabric upward along her thighs; so slowly that it was agonizing. Slowly enough to have been memorizing the texture of her skin.

So badly she wanted to grab his hands and force them to move more quickly, if for no other reason than to make the aching go away, but that would have caused her to move away from the startlingly fascinating contours of his chest and shoulders. How something as simple and common as anatomy could be so intoxicating was completely beyond her, but she couldn't for the life of her bring herself to take her hands away.

All of a sudden he pulled away, whirling about on light feet and adopting a defensive position in front of where she lay, startled and gasping for breath. He was instantly alert, shifting mood and awareness in that split moment of time and energy. With such a swift, simple switch in position he was prepared to shield her, ready for any kind of attack…but perhaps not the one that was given.

"_Easy,_" a silvery, slippery voice drawled, tone dripping with a mischievous amusement, "no need for violence."

Lilith started alarmed by the sudden intrusion into what had been such an intimate moment. She stared quite unabashedly at the newcomer who rose from a seated position in the chair across the room, then back to the angel poised before her. He had calmed quickly upon apparent recognition of the voice. Tense figure relaxing, he casually called the stranger a "bastardization of the word _privacy._"

The man was thin and wiry, built like a leaner martial artist and decked from neck to toes in a suit of what appeared to be shiny black leather wound in places with scarlet and gold. The front of this, she noticed, was zipped up only part of the way and casually displayed an ample slice of his chest. He had a clever, fox-like face that was streaked with a shocking flop of silvery white hair and snapping tawny eyes. Actually, when she looked more closely, she could see that the color was actually composed of several rings of golden hues which melded to create a catlike illusion.

Grinning widely at the angel, who stared stoically back, he defended, "you couldn't expect me to just sit around and wait for you to introduce me. And I couldn't have picked a better time to drop by!"

With a wink in Lilith's direction he swept into a courtly, ironic bow before reaching out to snare her hand in a surprisingly light grip. He brushed a polite kiss to her fingers, all the while looking up into her eyes. "So _you__'__re_ the object of this old bird's affections, are you?" His eyes swept casually over her, taking in her flushed, ruffled appearance as though blatantly scanning women was something he did regularly. "Can't blame him. Not in the slightest."

Feeling distinctly embarrassed and a little wary of the stranger, Lilith pulled her hand out of his grasp to smooth the poor, battered skirt hem into place, modestly squeezing her knees together. It didn't do much good. Rips aside, the dress hadn't exactly covered much skin.

"Beelzebub…" The tone to Azrael's voice was airy but firm, a slight touch of warning intertwined with the offhand call.

The stranger backed off. He flashed her a roguish smile before his golden eyes caught sight of Azrael's shirt, mussed and half-discarded thanks to Lilith's curious hands, and raised a silvery eyebrow. "If you're gonna take it off, just take the damn thing off, will you?"

The angel gave him an aggravated look and did just that. Gripping the garment by the hem he pulled it over his head with a decisive roll of his shoulders. The tie that had been attempting to hold his hair back came with it and the mane of pale blond hair fell to just barely brush the nape of his neck.

Lilith's cheeks burned, her eyes quickly averting from the strong, beautiful body that was so casually exposed to her, determined not to stare at the flesh exposed by no shirt and a pair of jeans riding low on lean hips. She was mollified that something as simple as a half-naked man could cause her chest to compress like that. It wasn't as though she'd never seen a boy without a shirt before…

Beelzebub noticed her show of embarrassment and grinned, clearly amused. "_My_…doesn't take much, does it?"

Looking irritated, Azrael slapped him sharply across the shoulder with his discarded shirt, which brought a scandalized noise of protest from the silver-haired man. Then he turned to Lilith, his expression kind and the song in his voice one of gentle compulsion. "Why don't you get ready for bed, Sweetling? You've had a trying evening." She nodded absently, standing shakily and heading toward the door that led to her bed and bathrooms. He watched her go, a fond light in his violet eyes. "I'll come bid you goodnight in a moment."

When the sound of the bedroom door closing reached their ears, Beelzebub let out a long, low whistle. "If anyone ever tries to insult you by saying you have poor taste in women, send them to me and I'll set 'em straight." He flopped down on the abandoned couch, propping his feet up on the coffee table and tipping his head back to look up at the other man. Azrael seemed not to have heard. The angel's violet gaze was still trained to where Lilith had last stood, looking slightly dazed.

A short crow of laughter burst from Beelzebub's throat, one booted foot extending to push his friend into a chair. "You're so freaking smitten."

Azrael glanced distractedly at the other male. "Sorry, what?"

Snorting, Beelzebub repeated shortly, "I said: you're fucking obsessed." Azrael began to protest, but was allowed no more than a word. "Don't try to fool me, I saw the way you were touching and kissing her. Just the way you look at her, it's easy to see how badly you want the girl."

The frustration in Azrael's eyes melted with a flush of blue as he sighed. But with a firm shake of his head, he argued, "it's not just that. I'm not denying what you said," he noted quickly when Beelzebub regarded him with dry disbelief, "but it's more than touch. I just want her to look at me without seeing an ill-meaning stranger—"

"Don't bother trying to explain, please. You know I don't understand these things," the silver-headed male interrupted with a yawn as he stretched his leather-coated arms above his head. "All I know is how to piss people off."

Azrael laughed quietly, his expression fondly derisive. "I would expect nothing less from you, Princeling."

Beelzebub sat up so fast that his movement was nearly untraceable, a blur of motion colored in black and red as he glared avidly at his companion, hissing, "_don__'__t_call me that—"

"Why not? You _are_a Prince, aren't you?"

"Yeah, but—"

"—and younger than I, thus…" Azrael got to his feet, reaching out to tousle his friend's silvery hair.

He left Beelzebub swearing good-naturedly behind him as he slipped through the open archway that led to the apartment's main hallway, pulling the discarded shirt back over his head. While his spoken reason would have been to preserve some sense of dignity, he had no issue with displaying his skin. He knew his charge would feel more comfortable if he was polite enough _not_to remind her of what had happened that night. No matter how sweetly the memory caused his blood to sing.

It was strange to move through the familiar apartment in plain, solid view. He had spent so much time there that this might have seemed overly sensitive, but all those occasions had featured cloaking spells and invisibility. He half expected her to walk around the corner from her bedroom and walk right through him as she had done several times before. Yet for the oddness of the sensation that came from the fingers he trailed along the wall, there was also a comfort to it. He was home here, where she resided, surrounded by the things she loved.

He knocked softly, a brief rap against the warm pine of her bedroom door.

"Come in."

Lilith was already in bed when he entered, hair combed and face freshly washed, snugly tucked under the covers with a book in her hands. She had exchange the torn dress for nightclothes; a long-sleeved thermal shirt and probably pants to go with it, which was no doubt more comfortable, perhaps in more ways than one. The garment in question, he noticed, had been laid over the back of the chair in one corner. An oddly reverent thing to do for something she had apparently so disliked.

As he shut the door she gave him a small, shy little smile before marking her page and setting the book down on the bedside table to offer him her complete attention. Whether it was because she wanted to enjoy his company or because she wouldn't have felt quite safe otherwise, he couldn't be sure.

With a courteous, inquiring gesture he sat on the edge of the bed. "I'm sorry about the interruption," he implicated the door's direction with a minute jerk of his head, pale hair gleaming under the hard light of her bedside lamp. "He isn't exactly a master of etiquette, as can be expected from the Crown Prince of Hell."

Though her eyes widened briefly, it was the only indication that the mention of Beelzebub's title had startled her. Considering what he'd said, she didn't look all that surprised. She shook her head, tucking a strand of dark hair behind one ear, indicating a brushing aside of his apology. "It's not that big a deal. I—um," she hesitated, looking timidly down at her hands. "I'm kind of glad he did." Her eyes flickered tentatively up just in time to watch a strange expression cross his face, a slight wince that was almost one of hurt.

"_Oh!__" _Her eyes widened, horrified. "No, I didn't mean it like that—"

"I know," he murmured, reassuring her with a soft, if slightly wry, smile. "I understand. Your positive experiences with men have been few and far between, and you're nervous. There's nothing wrong with wanting a bit of space." He looked away, his brow furrowed with invisible lines of what could only have been guilt. "I shouldn't have touched you like that, it was inappropriate in time and manner."

"It's ok…" she began, mostly to be polite. But as the words came, she realized that she didn't actually want him to think she hadn't liked his kissing…not that she _had_, exactly. So much complication for something that seemed like it should have been simple!

"No, it's not." He sighed, but said no more. There was no reason to explain to her that whatever affection she felt for him just then would be gone by morning. Trauma had a way of toying with the human mind, making it feel things that weren't real. She had allowed him to put his hands on her for no reason other than a weakened sense of boundaries after having been treated as roughly as she had – comparatively, he had been the lesser of two evils. Having taken advantage of her in such a state would only set him back once she realized what he had done.

She might not have said it consciously, but she had as well as admitted her insecurities. She neither knew nor trusted him, nor did she realize that to become closer to him would mean to dislodge all her comfortable assumptions about everything from her self awareness to her sleeping spirituality. The look she gave him was uneasy, flickering between his face and the place beside her knee where his hand rested, still and pale.

To ease the uncomfortable quiet, he leaned over to study her choice of reading material. A moment later, his lips parted to form an amusedly crooked grin. "_In __God__'__s __Hands,__" _he read aloud, _"__Understanding __the __Angelic __Hierarchy..._"

Blushing, she quashed the squirming sensation in the pit of her stomach, feeling like a child caught in mischief. "I was curious."

She hung her head, watching out of the corner of her eye as he picked up the thick volume and flipped it open to read the inside cover. It was the book she had discovered hiding amongst the back shelves of the library, dusty and worse for wear in the religious section, calling to her need for information and understanding. She was embarrassed that he'd seen it, though she wasn't sure why. Perhaps she assumed he would laugh at her childishness for seeking a source that was most likely flawed at best.

But instead of teasing her, he laid the book back in its place and let the subject lie.

"I should go. I have a few errands to attend to before the night ends."

Almost immediately after the words left his mouth, he noticed a grayed, disappointed shadow cross her face. She reached out to turn off her light, dousing the room with black penetrated only by the soft glow of electricity from the streets outside her window. Even in the darkness he could see that she deliberately avoided looking at him as she situated herself between blankets and pillow.

If there was anything he despised, it was seeing his ward was upset when he had the power to prevent it. The poor girl was clearly still rattled and of course she would unconsciously seek some kind of comfort even if she wasn't doing so intentionally. But he did need to leave. He had skipped some visitations to attend the meeting and had pushed them back even further in order to help her, not that he regretted doing so.

What he really wanted was to stay with her, knowing that the more time he spent in her company the easier it would be for her to adjust to his presence, and the less brutal her retaliation would be when she regained the majority of her senses.

"May I visit you tomorrow? I was considering accompanying you home from work, since your car is still in the shop."

His vision was very sharp, even in the dark, so he could see that she looked no more disturbed than she already had. What surprised him was the timid touch to the open palm of his hand. Delicately, as though trying to decide whether or not she was dreaming, she traced the thin lines of callus and scarring that decorated the skin beneath her fingertips. "Sure," she murmured; certain that regardless of whether she consented or not, he would be with her just the same, and wondering whether she should feel pleasure or dread because of it.

He nodded and stood, lightly squeezing the hand that paused at the center of his palm. "Then I'll see you tomorrow. Now, get some rest."

She closed her eyes briefly, trying not to laugh like a hysterical child. Rest; as though she wasn't already fighting to keep herself awake. When she had opened them again, he had gone, his elegant silhouette having completely and silently vanished from her room. All of a sudden an ache of terrible, utter loneliness threatened to swallow her in its black jaws. She was startled to realize just how much she had liked his company – his voice, his soft, affectionate touches. Did that mean something?

Shaking her head to clear it of the sense of loss she let her eyes close, forcing herself to look toward the new day and when she would see her angel guardian again. Lilith had never been the sort of girl to moon after charming princes or knights in shining armor, and she had never admired the idea of a protector when she'd imagined she had done well enough without one. Yet she was looking forward to tomorrow.

As she dropped off to sleep with the sound of Azrael's voice in her mind, she was fitful and restless; stricken with the remnants of emotion she still didn't understand.

Then, with a stroke of invisible ease, the loneliness was soothed with a hush of calm and comfort that settled over her like a cloud to make the sleep rest more easily upon her. The brush of warm air was soft against her cheek, the shape of lips touching a gentle, affectionate farewell to her skin before the presence of the angel dissipated from the room and she was left alone with nothing but quiet dreams.


	10. Molested With Melancholy

**Chapter 12  
**Molested With Melancholy

Recommended Listening: "Song of the Sibyl" and "The Arrival and the Reunion" by Dead Can Dance

* * *

"I shouldn't have kissed her."

One amber eye slid open, the pupil filling out from nothing but a thin slit of black to the rounded circle of a human's as it watched a worn, ruffled-looking Azrael slump into the chair opposite the heavy desk. "Hello to you too," Beelzebub snipped, "please sit, tell me how you're feeling. Do let me be your psychologist, it'd mean _ever_ so much to me." The angel flashed him a vicious glare, pale eyes catching the light to emphasize the severity of the warning, but the demon merely rolled his eyes and sighed. "So what? Think of it as detox. She's gotta get used to it sometime."

But it was not so easy to stop Azrael from fretting. Running a hand through his wild hair, he tossed his coat to the floor with a tense abandon. "I pushed her. Come morning she'll have nothing but hatred for my nerve to—"

"Oh whatever, you're not _that_ bad of a kisser," the demon mused, eye slipping closed again.

Azrael frowned, not bothering to hide his irritation. "As if _you_ would know."

"Sure I do! Remember that time in Hungary when those gypsies thought you were a Specter and we had to prove you weren't by showing human attachments? _God_, I'd never wished I was really a woman so bad in my life. You did this thing with your tongue—"

"Enough!" The angel snapped, "you were _not_ supposed to talk about that!"

Beelzebub's lips curled with a sly grin. Baring his sharp teeth in a grin that was both predatory and slightly sinister, it was clear that the incisors were narrow and pointed like a carnivore's, his draconian heritage displayed with a sly hiss of a laugh, "yeah, well, it's hard to forget something so monumental. Have you kissed _her_ like that?" He frowned, pondering, "probably not, or you'd have got her in bed by now."

"Would you please stop talking about my kissing?" Azrael looked neither very pleased nor encouraged, but the hard edge to his demeanor had softened with the exposure to his friend's quick humor. It had always been a balm to his habit of drowning himself in angst. All the same, he retained the vaguely haunted countenance of a man set back in his goals by a few hundred steps.

With a groan he leaned forward to rest his head in his hands, shadowed with doubt. "What should I do? I don't think I can go back to suffering without touch, not now that I know—" He curbed himself to silence, leaving an odd ring to the last uttered word as though he had literally bitten the thought in half before he could breathe it life.

The demon quirked a silvery eyebrow. "Know what? How soft her skin is? How sweet she tastes? How good it feels to have her arms—her _legs_ around you?"

Paled lavender eyes flashed suddenly dark with a furious ardor and lifted to the silvery demon's face. "You are _not_ helping," Azrael hissed, and it was not the sound of a casual complaint. It was the hiss of cornered warning, the rattle of a viper's tail from a creature that could tear out the throat of a man twice his height and weight without sparing more effort than it would have taken to spear an orange. This was the hiss of an immortal experiencing a flare of temper, but it didn't threaten his company; Azrael was simply expressing his sorely-tried feelings in the quite capable language of demonkind.

"All that and more," he growled, the sound rolling from his throat like the voice of a thundercloud. "I can't trust myself not to lose what control I still have. If I get anywhere near her again…I don't know what I'll do. I don't have the right to risk her safety so carelessly."

"Oh, _please,_" Beelzebub scoffed, dropping his legs from where they had been propped against the desk and reaching for one of the drawers to withdraw a small bottle of sun-colored liquid and two cut crystal glasses. "Far as I could see, she was taking it just fine. In case you didn't notice that you were going for the underwear, let me draw your attention to the fact that she wasn't complaining. And then you ruin a perfectly good _rendezvous_ just to bitch at little ol' me…"

With a lazy, practice tip of his wrist, the demon filled one glass and held it out for his friend, the set of his sharp, clever features pinched with a mild, good-natured grumpiness. "Seems to me there might be a little moodiness there for _lack_ of continuation, not the other way around. You're too much of a gentleman. Just take her by the hips, throw her over the kitchen counter and—"

"No." The angel's pale hand accepted the drink. Leaning back, he drank the liquor in two swallows as Beelzebub poured one for himself. "I can't do that to her."

Downing his own liquor like a pro, Beelzebub snorted. "Why the hell not? Just have_done_ with it already."

"You weren't there to hear her," Azrael explained. "She was glad you interrupted, Beel. _Glad._ I didn't know whether to be insulted or tear my heart out to stop the pain. She claimed it was due to nerves, but I know better." He closed his eyes, letting out a long, quiet breath too soft to be a sigh, fine-fingered hand lifting to his temple as though to soothe a headache he couldn't possible have.

Silence met the end of the confession. Beelzebub gave his friend a deep, hard look, peering into the dejected angel with the perceptive power of his tawny amber eyes. Despite the flippancy and indifference, he knew very well how badly it hurt Azrael to think that his chosen girl wasn't accepting him, when everyone knew how much he needed her. The angel of death was not faring well after so many centuries alone; and he needed the little spark of affection the mortal woman could offer him in order to heal. There was more than just the angel's pride riding on the outcome…enough more that her rejection bordered on dangerous.

After a long moment the demon said, "I don't know much about safety being a concern when it comes to intimate matters; but all I can say is you don't know for sure she's turning you away. Some women need to take it slower than others. Some just get antsy." He shrugged and poured himself another helping of alcohol. "I suppose since you're looking for more than a lay, you should be persistent. Your intentions are good, so just be patient, keep spending time with her. She'll come around unless she's completely incompetent…which I doubt. You never did go for the dumb ones—and Rebecca doesn't count because that was a temporary system-error."

Snorting, the angel stuck out his empty glass, which Beelzebub graciously refilled. "Thank you, kindly."

"Oh, you're welcome," Beelzebub answered before tipping back his own glass and draining the liquid. He set it back down, licking his silver-painted lips with a pale pink tongue.

Azrael noticed, eying his friend with a lifted eyebrow and a quick scan, taking in the tight-fitted strips of leather that barred his torso and the garment of leather and pieces of smooth black fabric that swathed his figure from the hips down to mid-calf. The combination of the garments and the silver paint that decorated his skin with swirling, archaic designs made the angel's eyes soften and his lips curve with a smile. "It's November 13th; I had forgotten." With a soft laugh, he asked, "are you going to dance for me?"

Beelzebub's expression lightened to show he was pleased with the change in topic. Hopefully it meant Azrael would take the advice to heart and be himself again come morning, renewed in both energy and patience. "Yup, Death Day. And as to the dancing…only if you do it with us."

With a small sigh, Azrael gave his friend and confidant a rueful smile. "With so many formidable women in the family, I wouldn't dare do otherwise."

The demon's grin made way for the laughter that crackled like hot sparks from his lungs. "Hah! But as we're already running late…we might not escape _all_ that wrath." He stood from his chair and crafted a deep, mocking bow with the bend of his back, accented by a great deal of flourishing with his hands.

Azrael followed him to the door, calmly stripping from his mortal clothing. A blue cotton shirt was pulled off over his head and tossed carelessly over his shoulder, black jeans unbuttoned, unzipped, and shucked from the legs like an unwanted cocoon. With every garment that was removed, he felt lighter, weighted less by the concerns stemmed from fatigue and useless worry. When Beelzebub stopped, propping the door opened to the dark, deserted hallway with his heel, he was holding new clothes.

These he handed over, offering a crooked smile and said, "you know where to find us." And he left, melting into the air to reappear elsewhere, far from the modern lights and metal cares where nothing but what was real and old and true mattered.

The angel smoothed his hand across the soft black leather and rich, silken fabric. They were familiar garments, ones he had worn many times for the same reason; one which followed in the footsteps of a holiday that had lost its meaningful heritage. It was not the cheap, plastic- and sugar-crafted occasion of the human race that had once been All Saints Day, and the closing of the ancient year in time with the close of the October harvest. It had been called many things; the Day of the Dead, Samhain, All Hallow's Eve, and each name was both truth and illusion to what it really was.

Every culture had a way of reconciling with death as an element, whether it was to celebrate it or to mourn their loved ones' passing with elaborate rituals, the marks were there. It was the cultures that tried to honor him to the best of their abilities (instead of fearing him unnecessarily) that he found endearing. Their methods were never quite spot on, however. They helped, but they weren't quite enough.

He often forgot how much he loved it, his day, not for the worship but for the cleansing, regenerative qualities the ritual contained. Once he thought to consider it, there was no question as to why he had been sinking so low in mood, why he had been feeling so cramped and restless. It hadn't been Lilith's fault that he had thought her relief for space was a rejection; it had been his growing thirst for the communal fire.

But no matter. All would be repaired that night.

He donned the clothing with a familiar ease, slipping into the beloved raiment of his element – darkness, comfort, time, and grace lined with just the barest traces of the baser sensuality that lay in adornment. The lovingly worn straps that crossed his chest and back were soothing and slid against his skin like the touch of a calming hand. The fabric draped across his thighs was softer than a whisper.

With a smile, he closed his eyes and pulled the air into the shape he wanted, using his immortal gifts to transport his body from modern civilization and back into lands crafted and named in the Ancient World.

It was a ritual older than recorded time, spanning the ages back to the fall of the devil and the creation of the earth; a ritual that celebrated the eternal circle that was his very being – life, death, and renewal. It had been performed every year on the same day since the dawn of his purpose, and though the events remained the same the assortment of people who gathered with him always changed, fluid and flexible as the time each mortal life was allowed.

There were never any barriers between the ability or strength of male and female, no difference between the demonic and the angelic, the light or dark-skinned, the higher Seraph or lower, common demon soldier. There, everyone was loved, everyone participated, everyone glowed, and everyone drank of the power they would share with Death.

In the old forests of old Britain there was a circle of smooth, uneven stones. It was a small ring, roughly five feet in diameter all the way around, with nothing truly spectacular to be seen about it apart from its position at the exact center of a large, open clearing surrounded by thick, ancient trees. But it was a sacred place. One of the many stone circles erected, not by the ancient peoples of the British Isles, but by immortal kind for the sake of ceremony. It was a place of rebirth, of strengthening, and it was where the angel of death received thanks for his power and his role of great, tragic importance.

The greeting he received was silent by ear, but the air was filled with the humming energy of a spiritual nature. Immediately he was approached one man and one woman, each carrying a small bowl carved of onyx stone filled with liquid silver. Their faces were masked by great, sweeping structures of crow and raven feathers, the trailing manes cascading to their shoulders like a waterfall of shimmering wings. The straight, shaped beaks of engraved silver and onyx shielded their features, but he knew who they were.

Beelzebub, his brother-in-arms, and Enoch, his own twin sister; their eyes dark and glittering with light from the full moon as they dipped their fingers into the paint and began to trace swirling, archaic designs onto his white skin. They burned when drawn upon his body, but he held out his arms and tipped back his head to the hands that made them. The sensation was a sweet kind of pain which lingered only for a moment. Soon enough the lick of flame was replaced with a tingling coolness.

"_Avis,__"_ they murmured, his most formal of titles spoken with hushed, gentle reverence while Enoch's fingers traced his lips with paint. Even Beelzebub, who normally would have choked on the word of the holy tongue, said it smoothly, without stumbling. This was because upon his day, those who knew the touch of the moon were excused from the binding that tied them from the words of God. All would speak equally.

They smiled, though the expressions were hidden. They were all masked, his immortal crows, his close friends and family of both realms, but he knew all of them with a single sweeping scan of violet eyes.

Azrael took the mask offered to him. This one was only slightly different from the rest, accented with streaks of purest white amid the coal-black mass of feathers trailing down to brush the middle of his back. The beak was not straight like the others but curved; a regal imitation of a falcon's. He held it in both hands, his gaze affectionate as he looked down at the elegant construction before lifting it and set it upon his head to conceal his own face with the soft embrace of feather and stiffened cloth.

Raising his hands to the sky, his throat contracted with the breath he inhaled. The earth stood still, time frozen, stretching the moment like thick taffy, a prolonged second of silence and bated breath.

The steady beat of a drum was laid upon the air. It was quiet, as an echo from far away, and created a slow, soft tempo that quickened like the pace of a frenzied heart. The air sparked and crackled with energy. Lightning forked above, striking the sky like tears of a hot blade through gossamer. The steadily rising power of the current pulled their magic, their spirits, and their strength into the prominent focus of their minds. Pouring from the skin, the thick waves of spiritual energy and chakra twisted, twined, and coiled about the gathered, statuesque figures, thin and silky as warm satin ribbons.

He took another breath and lifted his voice, the note low and trembling with feeling and magic. The pulse sped on, the drums racing in volume while his voice rose and fell; the melody tugging at the heart by the chakra threads exuding from each figure like a puppet-master would pull at his marionette's strings.

Hazed with shadow and movement, the world blurred. The threads of energy converged into a single, solid mass gathered at the center of the ring of stones, sparking and flickering until it bloomed into a pure spherical fire of a deep, mythical amethyst. It hovered, a bonfire of magic, steadily burning two feet above the ground.

The revelers dropped their raised arms to spiral into a dance older than the grassy earth beneath their feet; their bodies swaying, circling the fire while their flesh arced and spun, muscles flexing as they leapt and fell to the ground. Fluid and loose, their heads tipped back to fill their eyes with starry sky, then down to the earth; moving as only myths described. Like Pagan worshippers, they keened and hummed with song.

With every moment that passed, with every beat of the drum, the magical fire burned brighter with the strength they fed to it. It shone brighter and brighter until the entire clearing was locked in a trance which mirrored the very heights of corporeal ecstasy.

Not one touched any other, not physically. Yet while they whirled and swayed like primitive servants of ancient, long since forgotten gods, a fluid plethora of memories, thoughts, dreams, and emotions flowed through them like water along the strands of their magic. Pieces of multiple presences exchanged from mind to mind and heart to heart. From mild worry to unanswered questions, to a harbored grudge, to weariness, to joy, the combinations were endless. And the most vivid of those was deep, trembling, unfettered, blinding, white-hot love.

It was devotion so powerful that it shoved all other scattered bits of thought and wonder aside, pressing down upon the shuddering figures that had called it forth to be seen and shared. The longing was so potent and so intense that their bodies faltered as a single, unanimous entity. Each pair of feet stumbled mid-whirl, inserting a collective gasp amid their tribute to union and wholeness.

The fire seared white and shattered into shards of light and knowledge that flew swiftly back to their original owners. Thoughts and dreams buried themselves back into the minds from whence they had been birthed; emotions sank back into their rightful homes and the violet flame vanished into the darkness. Voices slipped into a silence dotted by ragged breath and the slump of many bodies as they fell to the ground in their circle. The moonglow paint smeared across muscles that glistened with sweat and black feathers spilled upon soft grass lit only by the luminance of the waxing moon far above them.

Exhausted, but pleased, the congregation lounged in the grass, lifting their heads to watch one of their number stand, a shallow stone bowl cupped in her hands. It was filled with scarlet, a wine that was thickened with age and with the skins of rich grapes. Underneath the brilliance of the moon, it shone like blood.

She knelt at Azrael's side and held the bowl for him to take. "_Ahl__'__im __en __deva __ha__'__anael._ Drink the blood of time," she told him. "and be reborn."

Since the ritual's conception so many centuries ago, this was the one part that could never be perfect.

The entire reason for the surge of power and sharing of strength was found in Azrael's weakness, the heart inside his chest which dragged him from the breath of solace. Death's work was difficult and no one with even the faintest of reckoning would contest it. The task of caring for deceased souls – all of whom carried weights that had to be in some way shouldered by the angel who guided them – was draining. The purpose for this one night of celebration mixed with an offering was to offer him some assistance in carrying that burden.

It was a meeting of the crudest opposites; man and woman, dark and light, earthly and immortal. But there was no suitable opposite for him. He had no mate, no one to share the largest portion of his stress or offer him the most strength to persevere, and therefore the position was left empty.

Accepting the bowl, he shook back the falcon mask to free his mouth. The brush of feathers was a quiet caress down his mostly bare back before it dropped gently to the grass and he tipped some of the thick, potent immortal liquor down his throat. It seemed to ignite on its way down, scouring his nerves clean and stripping his soul of worry and hardship. He murmured a hushed word of gratitude when he handed the bowl back to Pandora for her to drink as well, as indicated by tradition.

Azrael looked up into the demoness' silver-gray eyes just before she shucked her mask to swallow, and felt the strings of determination coil around his heart. Some day, if all went well, it would be Lilith sitting beside him. And instead of drinking from a bowl he would be drinking directly from her lips; drinking from _her._ That was how it was supposed to be.

How he needed it to be.

The end came hand-in-hand with the wine; and end followed by some hours lying beneath the sky, talking and resting. It wasn't meant to end so abruptly, but it was all they could manage. Even if the law had allowed it, Azrael would never have been able to bring himself to lie with one of his immortal sisters, no matter how distant the relation was. Some day, it would be Lilith who drink first of the blood of time, the wine of the ages; Lilith who would smear the red across her lips and offer him new life, Lilith whom he would take to his bed. It was Lilith who would replenish his soul.

He settled for giving Pandora a smile and rolling onto his back, listening to the soft, aimless chatter of his friends and siblings, reciting the words of a prayer that had been his tie to hope for more years than he cared to count. Longing for a time that, God willing, would come soon.


	11. I Want the Sun

**Chapter 10  
**I Want the Sun

Recommended Listening: "Escalay (Waterwheel)" by the Kronos Quartet  
and "When You Were Young" by The Killers

* * *

"Hey you! Come sit and listen to your music!"

Following her teacher's cheerful instruction, Lilith crossed the floor to sit by the large stereo at the front corner of the studio. She moved as quietly as was possible, her hesitation echoed in the padding of her bare feet. Jessica was exchanging a few quiet pleasantries with _Adrian _(so as not to disturb the rest of the ensemble class as they warmed up)_,_ as he a casual seated position with both knees bent and one hand braced flat against the resin-polished wood.

He looked no different; his hair was tied back in its normal small ponytail, the white-gold highlighting the tone of his skin against the deep burgundy wine color of his soft athletic pants and simple black sleeveless shirt. Not even the interesting addition of a thin gold chain clasped about his neck, weighted with something tucked beneath the shirt collar and out of sight, was all that odd. And yet she could see that something about him had changed.

There it was, buried within his eyes. The violet gaze was clear and bright, reflecting a mood that seemed significantly warmer than it was when she had seen him last.

After the exhausting trauma of the night of the assault, Lilith had seen Azrael only once – the very next day when he had met her after she finished her shift at work to escort her home just as he'd promised. Yet he had been brief, distracted from the world around him. In a quiet, subtle way he had appeared almost saddened, though that could have been an illusion of weariness (_did_ angels get tired?), and she had found herself rather worried about him. He hadn't kissed her again either, much to her relief; the memory of it still haunted her with a mixture of embarrassment and guilt.

Even through his distance, he had managed to bid her good night and wish her well until they met for their next rehearsal. He had left her at her doorstep before vanishing into the night like a ghost. That had been November twelfth, four days ago.

She had been vaguely aware that she wouldn't see him again until the rehearsal. But while in many ways she was grateful for the space and time to be alone with her thoughts, she had also noted that her nerves seemed more on edge _without_ his presence. The time had passed quickly, and soon enough she was heading out the door to rehearsals.

Her Toyota still in the shop, she was forced to walk the twenty block stint to the studio, her cautions on alert for speeding cars and suspicious people. Yet while she walked, she couldn't quite ignore the apprehension that gripped her insides with both doubt and concern.

What if something had happened? What if he had been wrong and by kissing her he had sentenced himself to some kind of punishment? Could he have been hurt on her behalf? The idea scared her, but surely he wouldn't have done it if the action would bring him injury. Either way, the two-ensemble exclusive rehearsal wouldn't make it difficult to spot him.

And sure enough, the first thing she saw when she entered the building was the pale gold gleam of his hair from the dressing room. He had paused to flash a beautiful smile her way, his gaze as sharp and piercing as it had ever been, only…renewed, she thought. That single look struck her to the bone, but he graciously stepped into the classroom and allowed her to breathe while she stowed her things in the converted kitchen.

Allowing John to use the floor for his quartet's beginning step-choreography, Jessica decided to utilize the first part of the session for her prized duet to hear their music for the first time and to brief them on the central themes she wanted them to envision. Upon hearing the track, Lilith's immediate interpretation was that of a string quartet mixed with an ethnic eastern African taste. It was beautiful, certainly, yet she dreaded the contents of the choreography her teacher had planned.

They had a simple story to tell; a loose adaptation of the love story behind the biblical myth of Queen Esther of Persia. The roles had been reversed, however. Lilith was cast as a woman whose wealth and beauty had given her power over men, but for all the riches she had she found no joy. Azrael's character had been enslaved, bought by those that served her to take a place in her harem. Without wealth or title he was seen as unfit to be anything but her inferior, and yet she loved him. A silly, romantic's tale, perhaps. But it seemed simple enough.

Once they had been taught a portion of the choreography Jessica had prepared for them, however, Lilith found herself completely and irrationally terrified. She had been right to guess there would be a large amount of physical contact, but having expected it was in no way the same thing as being prepared for it.

As the music was started for them to run through it in real-time – with contact and everything – she was rigid and uncomfortable, managing only the most basic elements of the scripted steps she had been given and no more. The idea of him touching her made her nervous and bashful. Afraid to misstep her way out of maintainable control, she shied from anything beyond the barest hints of contact. For his part, Azrael had not pushed her. He kept his distance, almost as though he could sense her distress.

Stiffly and awkwardly, the steps they had learned forced their way out like several large objects being shoved painstakingly into a far too-small space. But Jessica was not pleased with it. Halfway through their partially-assembled routine she shut off the music with a stab of her finger and rounded on the pair of them like an angry tiger.

The older woman strode onto the floor, her small stature tense with frustration as she ran stiff fingers through her marbled pink and purple hair. "What are you doing? This is _modern,_ you're not supposed to be so confined and conservative—you're partners not wooden puppets. Lilith," she turned to Lilith and gave her a tolerant but expectant look. "You're the body of this piece so stop tiptoeing and give it the strength I know you have. Don't act like you're afraid he's going to eat you—he's not! And you, Adrian…"

Jessica turned to him, an amazing amount of fire in her eyes when she told him, "You are the _soul_, honey. She may be the one in the spotlight but without you the story's lost. Your character knows there's more going on than there seems, and you have _got_ to show it."

With an expression of vivid compulsion, she stared into the angel's face, her hand rising to grip his shoulder. "You have to hold her as if you'll die without her. You've got to _need_ her—like you're going to have your way with her right there on the floor." She pointed to the golden wood, resin-stained and shoe-scuffed beneath their feet, to emphasize the words as they rang through the air with crisp, vehement clarity.

Lilith's eyes widened, feeling almost as though Jessica had handed her off to the guillotine with such talk. Scandalized as much as she was embarrassed, she glanced surreptitiously toward Azrael. He merely looked at her, infuriatingly unperturbed by the demands, his cool lavender eyes asking her for permission.

Permission for _what, _exactly?

She returned her gaze to Jessica, who was still half-glowering at him, and decided it would be best to play along with the mad artistry of her teacher. Sure, she didn't really want him in her space. But what was so terrible about a simple, professional partnering dance? Better him than that boy whose place he had taken, anyway. Managing to appear at least mostly calm, she met Azrael's questioning glance to give him an infinitesimal nod.

He turned to Jessica, allowing Lilith only a glimpse of the warm flush of color that had flushed his irises, offering their teacher a small smiled and assured her, "I can try."

Apparently appeased, Jessica nodded and went back to the stereo as her students reassumed their starting positions.

They began with their backs to one another in an illusion of separation when the first beats of the melody lilted into existence. Strong and serene, the notes colored the air with both warmth and mystery, and Lilith found her feet and hands located the choreographed motions purely from muscle memory. Her mind, she noticed, was _not _focused on the steps.

She could feel him watch her when she moved; hips and wrists twisted fluidly and gracefully as she stepped onto the dainty balls of her feet, finding the looseness that was a heavily modern-influenced style. It was as though there was nothing but his eyes, burning and pressing into her back. The heat of his skin so pronounced that she was amazed it didn't scald through her shirt while his choreographed walk took him in a slow arc behind her.

He caught her when she performed a dramatic feint to one side, angling her profile to the mirror. Her back arched over the crook of his arm, her neck following the curve and her eyes closing while she held the position as had been instructed. She would wait for three counts.

The touch of his hand upon her thigh sent a tremulous shock through her system. Guiding her knee into a shallow bend, his fingers traced the curve of her flesh to mold her into a new position. Startling her with the abrupt shift in mood from stiffly formal to lavish and hedonic, he interrupted her counting with little evident concern for throwing her off. His grip was firm when pulling her around to press her back to his chest. With his stature commanding the responsibility of motion, she had no control.

Though the sensation of complete vulnerability frightened her, Lilith forced herself to keep calm. He was just putting a bit more effort into placating Jessica's tempestuous mood; that was all.

Thanks to that wonderful muscle memory she managed to lift her arms to extend them sideways, reaching with fingers that curled with an artistic flare. But when his large, elegant hand slid against her abdomen in a long, prolonged caress from thigh to ribcage just beneath her breasts, her concentration was once again lost. It was a slow, grazing touch, the kind that screamed of lust to all who followed the shapely trail his palm left against her body. Her back stiffened, the breath trembling in her throat as she tried to shift subtly away from the blistering warmth that was his touch.

This_ travesty_ of an act was _not_ part of the choreography! Who the hell did he think he was? Infuriated and flustered, she couldn't think what else to do but go on with what she had been assigned.

She stepped lightly, modestly away, intent on continuing the next steps – only to find herself being yanked back and held firmly against his slim, muscular body. At first she was alarmed by the tight grip he used to cradle her wrists between his long fingers, but then she remembered he was right. She slid into the proper position with carefully controlled balance, her right leg extended behind the arch of her back, bending her other knee and noting that she seemed to spend a lot of time exposing her throat to him, not to mention what her camisole did very little to conceal for her. Not the wisest choice in attire, perhaps.

And then he was pulling her up again to lead her in a pattern of steps that were half-tango and half purely heinous. He was scandalously close; close enough for her to feel the definition to the stomach pressed neatly to her own, his hands shaping her back into a curve that coaxed her face upward.

His breath was warm. It wafted across her cheeks with a scent more delicious than anything she could have imagined. His eyes were veiled by thick, dark lashes but their focus was clear; she knew if she could have turned them to glass, she would see her own reflection there.

Her brain simply shut down. She could neither think nor breathe, consumed by the touch of his hand at her lower back and the mouthwatering flavor of his breath.

This wasn't supposed to happen! She was letting him dazzle her, just like she had before…and yet she couldn't tear herself away. The soft, undeniable heat flowed from every place their bodies touched, ensnaring her with the luscious sensation of unyielding muscle held against her flesh and the heady smell of his skin. Before she knew what was happening, her chin had tilted upward as though she meant to lift her lips to his.

All of a sudden, everything came crashing down.

The music was stopped and the sinuous, twining movement of their steps ceased as the store of muscle memory ran dry. Azrael's expression was torn between frustration and relief when he stepped away from her as any polite and decent partner in that situation would.

Almost immediately her skin felt cold, her insides sinking uncomfortably low and her heart pounding with the remnants of a connection she shouldn't have missed. She could have cried, reached out and pulled him back, begged him to just kiss her and end the torment he'd forced on her. Of course, she didn't. There was a frightening meaning behind that desire she had no intention of analyzing.

That was when she realized that the entire room had gone silent. She glanced around, disoriented, taking in the faces of her teachers and her friends, their partners; all staring at the two of them with wide eyes and open mouths, stunned and incredulous. Janelle recovered first, shooting her a smile and a thumbs-up to say she was proud.

If Lilith had been the type to swear, she would have. Her head was swimming, blood flushing in her skin to make her entire body blush. _What the heck was _that_?_ What had possessed her to react so strongly to his touch? His very presence disturbed her internal balance, shaking her like a maraca and setting her on her head.

And why – _why –_ had she been close enough to notice that his breath smelled of chocolate? One single whisper of it, heavy and fragrant, had been enough to send her stumbling into a surge of memory. She could recall that the flavor of that mouth was just as rich, just as exquisite and had a fleeting, haunting impulse to taste those beautiful lips again.

She shuddered, though she managed not to show it, and edged just slightly away from him, shocked and heartily ashamed of herself. Such thoughts were unnecessary and silly. They had only been doing what they had been told to do, as she was sure he would agree.

Jessica approached them with a hand pressed to her chest. "_That's_ more like it," she praised happily, "you were _amazing._ Are you sure you haven't worked together before?"

Azrael, coolly refusing to be ruffled by anything around him, nodded. "No, Ma'am. Never." He flashed Lilith a look that held a touch of well-concealed affection. "I suppose we just mesh well."

"I suppose so," Jessica agreed, sounding slightly punch-drunk as she continued to regard her dancers with a profound mixture of delight and intrigue. "Well that's it for tonight—I'll have some more choreography for you Friday, ok?"

Azrael smiled gently, a gesture that was a blow to every female in the room, and a purposeful one; Lilith could trace the amount of charm he used increase when he thanked her and gracefully turned to go. But this brought him to face her and she panicked when his eyes made to rest on her face.

She hastily pivoted, padding quickly across the floor and passing her classmates with a soft word of farewell before fleeing the studio and escaping to the dressing room. She tried to be quick, to avoid any conversation and above all to avoid looking him in the eyes again. But just when she was fumbling with the buttons of her sweater and the straps of her bag, she felt him enter the kitchenette behind her, his presence an aura of soft light and warmth at the very forefront of her attention.

She pointedly ignored him, waiting for him to gather whatever things he had brought and leave, or wishing that he would at least grant her the small dignity of privacy so she could happily go to pieces. But he didn't move. Instead, he simply gazed at her turned back.

When he spoke, his voice was so soft that the urge to cry gripped her with steely fingers. "Do you think I overdid it?"

For all her determination to keep silent, that set her off. Half her hair whipped loose from its messy knot when she spun around to glare at him with all the fury and frustration she could muster into a facial expression. How he could call that openly vulgar show _overdoing _when it was more like a scene from an X-rated film she was sure she would never know.

"_No,_ really?" she snapped, crossing her arms across her chest and averting her gaze. She refused to look at him, and thus refused to admit that she had anything but contempt for what had passed between them. "I'd call that the understatement of the _century!_"

"I hope you realize you drive me absolutely mad," he mused, perfectly calm despite the blush that stained her cheeks a rosy pink. "I try to keep distance for you and you act as dead as a rag doll. But I put forth just the barest bit of effort I can think of and suddenly you're pulling at the edges of my sanity."

Eyes fixed firmly to the floor, she felt him move to lean against the counter a few feet to her right, the burgundy-wine of his pants drawing a stark contrast to the cream, gold-flecked laminate of the countertop. Despite her effort to feign deafness, she had heard him all too well. The moment her senses returned, so too did her resentment. Hefting her bag over her shoulder, she insisted airily, "I don't know what you're talking about."

She started for the door and for the assurance of safety that lay beyond it.

The grip around her elbow was firm and quick as he yanked her around and pressed her back to the cool edge of the counter. His other hand pulled the bag from her arm and dropped it to the floor with a forceful thud.

"Oh, yes you do," he growled, and she stared up at him, stunned and frightened by his temper.

He gripped her by the arms, holding her so close that she could feel the powerful structure of his thighs and chest poised a mere hair's-breadth away from her. The tip of his straight, perfect nose was almost touching hers, his face so close that his sweet-smelling breath drifted over her again, crushing her better sense in a wave of incredible fascination.

"I saw the look in your eyes—I _felt_ your heart race when I touched you. _Do not_ tell me that I imagined it." The tone to his musical voice was hard, rough with raging emotion as he stared her down with eyes that were alluring despite their terrible, wine-colored anger. With those eyes to hold her captive she was powerless against him when he hit back. Grasping her by the chin, he kissed her fiercely, pouring all that passion down her throat to spill into her very soul.

Her heart leapt into her throat, her hands curling into the fabric of his shirt while he pressed her backward against the counter. The edge of the plastic-coated wood bit into the flesh of her upper back, but she hardly noticed. All she had to cling to was the knowledge that his lips were locked with hers, and that her lips had parted to accommodate him against her own conscious will.

His assault was merciless; demanding and harsh, but it was brief. Before she was able to work up her fear he had released her. She was left gasping for breath, not knowing that she had lost it, her chest heaving while she tried to push him away, scared by the harshness to a kiss that could have been wonderful without it. Fearful and intimidated by the rough edge he had taken with her, she quivered like a frightened deer, trying to move as little as was possible. He had proved dangerous when angered and she didn't want to end up like Kevin, with her head split open.

He took her face between his hands and smoothed a cheek against her hair, holding her gently, his rage so quickly cooled that it was difficult for her not to flinch.

"Forgive me," he murmured, his voice both soothing and shamed. "I shouldn't have lost my temper with you. I just—it affects me, having you so close, with you being so…" he paused to search for the proper word, "…so compelling. You reacted to my attempts to keep Jessica happy and I couldn't help but want you closer." A sudden lilt of laughter slipped from his chest, his tone warm and teasing when he added; "or did you think I wouldn't notice you smelling me?"

Her cheeks burned. What the blazes had she been thinking? "I…I'm sorry—"

"Don't be," he murmured, his touch at her temples trailing along the line of her neck to dissipate into air when he took a step back. "It's only fair. I don't have to make it a conscious effort to catch _your_ scent. It's always there…tormenting me." He sighed. "You have _no_ ideahow difficult it was for me to release you. I nearly did the very thing Jessica told me to consider."

Lilith skimmed her brain for every word of instruction her teacher had given him throughout the evening, running through the words to locate the ones he spoke of. She remembered with an absurdly delicious swooping within the pit of her stomach.

_You've got to _need_ her—like you're going to have your way with her right there on the floor..._

"I almost lost control. I very well could have made a lovely spectacle of myself due to your response to me."

He lifted a hand to cup her cheek, and she was horrified that she couldn't seem to pull away. It was an awful thing for him to have told her. What was more, she shouldn't want him touching her, nor should she like it. But when she looked into those soft, soulful amethyst eyes gazing serenely down at her, she knew that denying her attraction to him was as much of a lost cause as denying that she was female.

The edge of his thumb grazed her lower lip and his face shadowed with regret. "A _curse_ on my temper," he groused, examining the beginnings of bruises that colored her lips a timid purple. "Shame on my own shoulders for abusing such a beautiful mouth."

The mouth in question felt suddenly very dry, uncomfortably so, and on a quite instinctual impulse she licked her lips. Without her control (and to her stark embarrassment) the tip of her tongue brushed the finger he still touched to her lip. His eyes blazed, a searing, blinding rush of fire drowning out the all else to simply stare down at her mouth in what was unmistakable enchantment.

She froze, alarmed and flustered, and tried to choke out an apology. "I—"

He was gentler the second time, his mouth molding to hers with a heart-wrenching tenderness that drove the words from her tongue. Thoughts of protest melting into nothing, her eyes slid closed to welcome his hand as it traced the edge of her jaw, coaxing her to relax. Lips soft, tongue velvety smooth and languid, he moved with deliberate, practiced and admiring ease while cradling the base of her neck with a gentle palm.

It was almost reverential in nature, like a tender, physical song of apology and adoration. She sighed, feeling strangely at peace as he lured her slightly forward, arm circling her waist and fingers slipping beneath the hem of cardigan and shirt to brush her unprotected back. The touch of his skin against hers elicited a quick inhale, tugging a slow, luscious shiver to wind its way down her spine that could have been nothing but pleasure.

"…oh!"

Lilith jerked away as though he had bitten her, clapping her hand to her mouth and doing her best not to look in Alice's direction. She had been caught kissing in a public place…how perfectly, utterly mortifying.

"I'm sorry," the ebony-haired girl stammered, her caramel-colored eyes wide when Azrael turned slowly to face her, his expression composed of very carefully-summoned sheepishness. But Lilith knew better, even while _her_ face burned with a brilliant blush, she knew that the angel before her had not a bashful bone in his body. He wasn't shy. She seriously doubted that he minded being seen in such a position at all. Irritated by being forced to stop, however...

"I didn't mean to interrupt—"

"That's all right," he replied, backing discreetly away from Lilith and running a hand through his now loose, pale hair, the tie snared around a pair of his fingers. He played distracted, flustered even, but while Lilith could recognize the act, it seemed to be enough for Alice. "I was…a bit out of line anyway. I hope I can be forgiven."

Alice smiled shyly, glancing at Lilith with sparkling eyes and answered, "I think you may be."

Lilith could have died.

This was it; her world was collapsing around her. She was done for. Dead meat. Alice would tell Janelle and Janelle would tell Sarah; there was no stopping it now. It was the end of the world and all she could do was let out a weak, semi-despairing laugh as she clutched at the counter behind her and tried to understand why she couldn't block him out like she could all the others.

And just why she felt so childishly _giddy…_

_..._

It was with a conflicted and troubled resolve that Lilith returned to work the next morning. Though the weather was oddly warm for November, the rare appearance of the sun's cheerful rays did nothing to boost her spirits. She should have been happy; after all, if she couldn't have snow, at least she was spared from the gloom of the gray clouds and rain. But her mood was just as wretched as it had been the night before, and she had no idea why.

Maybe that wasn't as honest as it could have been.

As far as Lilith was concerned, it was either the result of being overworked by her overenthusiastic teacher or the irritation caused by being pestered for juicy details of her nonexistent love-life by her so-called friends. Almost as soon as she had walked through her door, exhausted from the choreography and effort she had been forced to put forth, it seemed that her telephone had been ringing itself off the proverbial hook.

First it had been Janelle calling to inquire as to why she had left class so early, and when Lilith couldn't answer the blond had apparently called Alice for an explanation. Whatever Alice had told Janelle, the results were nothing short of what Lilith had expected. Thin-lipped and ill-tempered, she had coolly attempted to explain to both Janelle _and_ Alice that there was nothing going on between her and the young man whom their teacher had assigned to her as a partner. But due to the fact that Alice had caught the two of them in a lip-lock, her arguments, assurances and pleas did little to convince them.

It had been Sarah's call that made Lilith lose her temper. Giving the redhead a firm denial that anything had happened and an excuse that she was tired and would talk to her in the morning, she had hung up, fighting the powerful desire to throw her cell phone across the living room. She hadn't been able to find the heart to do anything else but retreat to her bed, knowing that her pillows, at least, would not nip at her like eager puppies for a romantic bedtime story.

But sleep had not come very easily; and only after three solid hours' worth of tossing and turning in an uncomfortable mockery of rest did she finally drag herself up again, wandering idly between living room and kitchen in frustration.

What was the _matter _with her? She had never been so restless before in her life, but she refused to allow the cause to take up any more of her time and promptly drowned it out via Food Network Nighttime's _Iron Chef America_ marathon. Tired and irritable, she finally managed to drift to sleep on the living room couch.

Having woken up an hour earlier than usual under the impression that she was running late, she wound up in quite the sour mood after she had rushed to get ready for work before figuring out she was right on time. When she unlocked the back door to the library and set to working turning everything on, she had managed to cool her boiling grumpiness to a low simmer and begun fabricating her defense.

By the time Sarah came in eight minutes later, Lilith's defensive maneuver had already been mentally rehearsed so many times that she almost forgot to say it out loud. But as soon as she saw the red-head's mouth open, brown eyes sparkling with the tell-tale sheen of intrigue to the point of near-combustion, Lilith's reaction was immediate.

"Don't even think about it," she snapped, a little more forcibly than she had intended. "I told you, just like I told those other two gossip-fiends, there is _nothing_ going on in my love-life because I _have no_ love-life—"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Sarah lifted her hands, her eyes wide with alarm in response to the dark rage shadowing her friend's face. "Don't eat me! I was just going to ask how the choreographing went—nothing else, I swear!"

Lilith felt instantly ashamed of herself and quickly apologized. "I'm sorry, Sarah. I didn't mean to bite your head off."

Sarah shrugged good-naturedly, her smile kind as she dumped her ridiculously large purse (how she could be carrying anything less than a bowling ball and four bricks in that thing was beyond anyone's understanding) in her locker. "No worries, dollface!" The reply was far too chipper, reminding Lilith for the hundredth time how much she despised Sarah for being a morning person.

"I was just going to ask how your partnering thing went. I know you've never had one before so I was curious about what you're doing and how you're coping. _Ooh,_ what kind of music do you have? Have you seen your costumes yet? You didn't get a chance to tell me last week—"

But Lilith was no longer listening to Sarah's happy ramble. All her attention was fixed upon something that Sarah couldn't see. She hadn't expected the flood of feelings that rushed at her like the evening tide, swamping her in understanding that was both clear and borderline violent. For she realized now that it had neither been the physical exertion that had brought on her restless state, nor had it been the pressure of her friends, though neither had helped. The cause was something else entirely; something that had been a part of her since before she could remember.

Every event, every tiny detail in a person's life made an impact on how they developed, made decisions or solved problems, and how they viewed the world. It was no different for Lilith at that moment than for any other girl who happened to set her mind against the opposite gender.

Since childhood she had taught herself to keep a solid wall of suspicion and caution in front of her when dealing with men; from school into her working life, it had seemed that everything around her was telling her to keep away from the male race. Her father had beat her mother, hated and hit his daughter. The boys in elementary school had been full of snide, wicked comments about her old, used clothes and relationship with books. And then when her classmates started broaching adolescence in middle and high school, things got worse – with just a slightly different tone to curdle the fear inside her mind.

It seemed that all she could see was the negative. Two boys in her graduating class had been expelled for assaulting and raping a younger girl in the school's bathroom. A male teacher was fired for being inappropriate with female students. There were thefts and beatings and sexual crimes all over the news. And she couldn't see anything else.

Men, she had decided, were dogs; animalistic slaves to primal instinct and impulse. All but for the scant few until they reached a certain age, and even then there were exceptions that refused to become clean. What reason did she have to put any trust behind a gender so distorted with the worship of something like sex?

The process which led to childbirth had never held the glamour and mysterious appeal for Lilith as it had for her friends during their teenage years. She had never been one to join them in their experiments with flirting or splurging on mass numbers of tawdry romance novels to fuel a curious appetite for the forbidden fruit of something they didn't yet fully understand.

At first she had merely been as scandalized as everyone else had. She had been embarrassed and horrified by her fifth-grade exposure to the realities of conduct that must have passed between parents in order to produce the children sitting wide-eyed in front of the worn-out videotape describing the process of intercourse. But as everyone around her had started venturing out into the world of dating and young romance, she had remained steadfast in her belief that sex and anything related to it was nothing more than a collapse of hormones and self-control.

No matter what anyone tried to tell her, no one could convince her that there was anything remotely appealing about flopping about on a bed like a dying fish while gasping for breath and groping at someone else. No one could tell her that there was anything romantic about some man touching her in ways that made her want to shrink into a corner and cry. It had become an unprecedented phobia.

She had never argued with Sarah about her taste for boys, or Alice or Janelle for their beaus, because she understood that her beliefs were her own. The girls were entitled to their own lifestyles. It was just that she had been under the settled and happy impression that a life in pursuit of a forever-partner was not in her future. She _had_ been. But now…

She could scarcely remember how to breathe as she unwillingly recalled the sensation of a tender hand cradling the back of her neck, the gentle press of a mouth carved from white marble. Warm breath fanned across her lips, white-blond hair brushing her jaw when her head titled upward, a soft counterpoint to the firm solidity of another body flush against her own. An implication the severity of which had escaped her until now.

She choked on her mouthful of coffee, erupting into a coughing fit lined by horror. How could she have _done_ such a thing? How could she have let him touch her like that; as though she belonged to him? How _dare_ she look back on that with anything but disgust? She didn't even know him; she had no way to know whether he would do anything but take what she didn't want to give.

But he already _had._

"You ok?"

She vaguely recognized Sarah's voice calling her out of the black memory as she staggered for mental footing. Hysterical laughter bubbled at the base of her throat, struggling to free itself in more that just the strangled whimpering noises she managed to produce. Her entire body was trembling, her hands shaking so badly that Sarah had to take her mug to prevent her from spilling hot coffee all over herself.

She was pathetic, a sad little girl too terrified of confrontation to tell the jerk to go to hell and leave her alone, to stop messing with her brain and everything that made sense. He was _inside_ her somehow, pulling at the strings keeping her defenses in place, unraveling every preconceived notion she had. She was trapped against something she didn't understand. And even if she railed and shoved and fought with everything she had, there was no promise of being free from something powerful enough to make her forget who she was.

Sarah was staring at her, frightened for her friend as Lilith's panic drenched the atmosphere like a heavy mist. "What's wrong?"

Tears were welling in Lilith's bright green eyes. Her face was pale, almost bloodless, but she seemed to have calmed enough to remember how to speak. "I can't go back. I just can't—"

"Go back?" Sarah eyed the other girl with alarm, desperately hoping that Lilith wouldn't start crying. She had never seen Lilith act this way, never once in all the time she had known her, and it was awful. What had happened to frighten such a calm, quiet (if skittish) girl into such fits of terror? "Go back where?"

Lilith's expression was – there was no other way to say it – haunted. She swallowed a dry sob as she shook her head, sending her dark hair spilling from its tidy knot and into wispy tendrils of disarray. "I can't face him again."

Brown eyes widened, flaring with surprise. "_Him?"_

A man? Could this be the answer to why Lilith had been so jumpy lately? Sarah's eyes lit up with a dawning understanding while she eyed the other girl with sly curiosity. Of course it could. Alice had been vehement about what she had seen, and it couldn't be a coincidence that the very following day featured a small panic attack. It _had_ to be her new dance partner.

"Your ballet boy?" Sarah asked softly, doe brown eyes fixed to her friend's face.

With an air of almost puzzled worry, Lilith stared at her computer screen without really seeing it. She seemed confused, as thought her own memory was something alien to her. "It was like my body wasn't mine anymore…like my brain wasn't wired right." Suddenly she laughed, but the sound was dry and false when she buried her face in her hands. "_God—_I'm an idiot!"

"What—?"

"I let him touch me," Lilith sighed with a combination or mortification and tired uncertainty. "I _let_ him." She looked up at her friend with red-rimmed eyes. "What's wrong with me?"

But Sarah looked neither startled nor sympathetic as Lilith had expected. The red-head was smiling, her grin infectious and edged with a wicked warmth. "_Wrong?_ There's nothing wrong with that. How many times have I told you you need a good lay?"

Lilith scowled.

"Apparently you've found yourself a man you can not only tolerate—which is a miracle in itself—but you want to bang him too, which is even better." Sarah set the coffee mug down on Lilith's desk space, extremely pleased with herself. "I hoped you'd find someone eventually. I _really_ didn't want to sell you off to a convent."

Lilith said nothing, merely sat huddled in her chair looking tragically fragile and disheartened to the point where she couldn't form any words.

Sarah's smile faded. Reaching out, she took Lilith's hand and squeezed it gently. "I think you've always had a low tolerance for anything that you don't like on sight or doesn't fit your standards to perfection. Maybe you just had to find the right one before you could move past that." She paused. "And you know; the banging crack might not be so out of line. You're still a virgin, so you're bound to have some curiosity—"

"I _don't,_" was the instant denial

"—or maybe you just need to let out some tension. Everyone can use a round of good sex, even you. Oh, come on; don't look at me like that."

Rolling her eyes, Lilith chose to swallow several of the retorts she could have thrown at the other girl. "Well that's fine, but how do you explain why I hate men so much?"

Sarah shrugged, seeming very unconcerned. "Picky," she answered with a wink.

"Oh, shut up," Lilith snatched her mug and nearly inhaled half of the caffeine-rich liquid before setting it down again. Silent and in a terrible mood – no thanks to Sarah's lack of sympathy – she turned to her computer screen. But solitude wasn't meant to be, because Sarah was far too interested in the subject matter to be blown off.

The redhead made a noise somewhere between a wine and a sigh, resting her head against Lilith's shoulder and tugging on her sleeve. "I'm sorry I don't take you as seriously as you seem to think I should, but I really don't see the problem. You don't like women, so maybe you just had a late start with your hormones. What's wrong with that?" After a moment of waiting for an answer, which was met with nothing but frosty minute of silence worthy of several chirping crickets, Sarah begged: "_please?"_

There was no way to stay mad at Sarah. Sarah couldn't comprehend the gravity of the situation, nor could she understand why it was such a big deal. Besides, Lilith loved her like a sister and figured was darn lucky to have a friend who could take her mind away from things, which she couldn't deny that the redhead had. Already she could feel her panic go down, sinking to a level that was more manageable.

In the end, Lilith conceded. "Oh, _fine._"

"_Yes!_" Sarah cheered, punching the air with her fist and scooting her swivel chair close beside her friend's. "What does he look like?"

With resignation to color her sigh, Lilith forced herself to think about the one thing she had been attempting to forget about that entire week – her angel protector-slash-stalker.

Well she couldn't share _that_ particular piece of information with her friend. Knowing Sarah, the redhead either wouldn't believe her or she would fly off the handle and start freaking out about how she had always known angels existed…or that her friend's potential beau should have the authorities sicced on him. But that wasn't really the biggest issue. It would have been a betrayal of trust to share what he was, as well a break of divine law (not that she knew that for certain).

Besides, Lilith didn't think the police could handle him.

But she wanted to be honest. It was Sarah; who had gotten her a well-paying job there at the library, Sarah who had convinced her to go ahead and take the dance lessons she had wanted so badly, Sarah who had been her first _real_ friend in the world. She would be as truthful as she could without giving up the real, serious details. "Well…he's blond—"

"Tan?" Sarah interrupted eagerly before quickly slapping a hand over her own mouth.

"No, actually. He's whiter than I am…but in a good way." Lilith gazed down at the mug cradled in her palms, her eyes on the dark liquid sloshing around in time to the slight tremble of her hands. "He's beautiful." She hadn't meant to say it out loud, but it was too late to take it back.

"A pretty boy, huh? He's not all-face-and-no-brawn, is he?"

Lilith snorted, an exaggerated sound of mortified denial. "Not exactly. Unless you call six-foot-three, slim and solid muscle wussy."

Doe brown eyes widened. "_Wow_." Sarah smacked Lilith across the shoulder. "And you keep making it sound like the world's coming to an end! Does he have a horrible personality or something?"

"No…" Lilith admitted, though her reply was somewhat lacking in the enthusiasm department.

"Then _what_ is the problem?" Sarah cried, laughing.

Tucking a stubborn strand of hair behind her ear, she considered the question. What _was_ the problem? The problem was something she couldn't explain. "He's just—strange. I don't know why he's interested in me, or why he should care. Sometimes he says things…like he owes me something, even though that makes no sense. And I just—"

She grew quiet, silencing herself before she could accidentally spill secrets she wasn't sure she was supposed to share. She couldn't tell her friend what she was afraid of in earnest. So she settled for a statement that would cover the uncertainty, if not the fear. "I don't get it."

The explanation wasn't the easiest to follow, but Sarah understood that her friend was confused. Lilith hadn't had a boyfriend until the Kevin incident; and _that_ had been a fiasco which Sarah took complete responsibility for. It had been through her urging that Lilith had accepted a date with the guy. When Lilith had told her about what Kevin had done when she'd broken up with him, Sarah had gone to Paul and chewed him out for having the gall to set her best friend up with a psychopath. She had promptly dumped him, too, for good measure.

Lilith was clearly troubled by her attraction to this new boy, which Sarah could sympathize with, because sometimes feelings didn't work the way one wanted them to. But she also knew Lilith well enough by now to understand that what the other girl needed was definitely not a tirade of empathetic cooing. She didn't need something that would increase or justify her paranoia, she needed something to contrast it, thin it out, and make her think a little more rationally.

Sarah's determination to put the issue in another light had got her talking again, which was good. And who knew, maybe she would find it in her heart to accept the guy.

"It sounds like you've found the god of sex, and you're _complaining._"

Lilith frowned. "I didn't say A—Adrian was a god of anything."

"Just my interpretation," Sarah smiled. "_Adrian,_ huh? That's a pretty name, probably suits him."

His real name suited him better, but Lilith wasn't about to admit that in any way shape or form. "Mhm, I suppose."

Cupped her chin in her hands, elbows braced against the desk, Sarah leaned toward the brunette. "So, did he _really_ kiss you?"

Lilith frowned. She didn't want to talk about _that! _She didn't want to so much as think about the kisses she should _not_ have liked. But the pleading look on Sarah's face was not something easily ignored. Sighing in both exasperation and defeat, cursing her soft heart, she mumbled shortly, "yes. He did."

There was a moment of taut, expectant silence. "So…?" Sarah pressed.

"_So_ what?" Lilith took another sip of coffee, feeling as though she was missing something.

The redhead gave her a look that was clearly annoyed. "_So,_ how was it?"

"I don't know!" Lilith cried; the flare of her jumbled emotions akin to anger that wasn't actually there. "It was _kiss,_ what's it _supposed _to be?"

Sarah laughed, amused by her friend's innocence and quick frustration. "Just describe it."

Obviously uncomfortable with this demand, Lilith thought about it for a moment, but not deeply enough for her to sink into the memories that would make her blush and stammer. "Um…warm?" She asked, her voice lilting with insecurity.

Rolling her eyes, the redhead adjusted her blouse and got up to begin printing the various pull lists for the early shift. "I give up," she retorted, "you're hopeless."

Lilith made a face and switched on her computer, downing the last of her coffee in a single swig as Sarah pushed a fresh cart of books to be checked in toward the desk. But before she devoted herself entirely to the tasks of opening the library, she paused in the backroom doorway, her expression contemplative. "Seriously though, _have_ you ever thought that you just needed to meet the right guy?"

"All right, you…" Lilith began, only to be smothered by Sarah's affectionate laughter at her denial. Deep inside, however, she couldn't help but wonder if maybe this time Sarah was right.

Just this once.


	12. A Wish for Insincerity

**Chapter 13  
**A Wish for Insincerity

* * *

"Good evening, Balberith."

The heavily-stylized mass of plum purple hair lifted in response to the sound of the name that belonged to it. From where it had poured over the papers, files, and documents haphazardly strewn across the expanse of a wide, oaken desk, a thin face lined with great intelligence peered up at the guest. With a long finger riddled with ink-stains, smudges of charcoal and graphite, the demon pushed a pair of spectacles farther up the bridge of a bone-straight nose. "And to you."

Setting down his quill and giving the golden-haired angel his complete attention. It wasn't every day Heaven's ambassador took pains to visit scribes' nest at the roomy center of Hell's palaces. "The Prince received my message, then?"

Azrael nodded, drawing up a chair vacated by an orderly and seating himself with swift, silent grace. "He did, yes," he answered, regarding the male demon before him with approval.

One of the rare few that had become citizens of Hell through choice, Balberith was reigning king of the scribes in the devil's domain. He had been trained under Sandalphon as a young angel, learning from the first and the very best keeper of knowledge and history, but had grown weary of the fanatical turn taken by Michael during the Revolution. Turning away from Heaven had been his self-sacrificial method of protest, and one that had not gone without the proper honor it deserved.

Azrael had always liked the foppish, often contrite demon, and admired his matter-of-fact method of dealing with politics; yet this visit was neither for idle chitchat nor a recommendation for reading material. Balberith seemed to guess as much, but chose not to comment on it. The demon simply looked at him over the over the silver-rimmed lenses tinted with a rosy pink.

"What can I do for you?"

"I need to see the disciplinary records from the last fifty years, if it wouldn't be too much trouble. It's in regard to the Stalin family case Minos and I continue to puzzle over." Azrael tone his voice light, but he knew his eyes betrayed the mixture of weariness and conflict he had no hope of hiding.

A single plum-colored eyebrow quirked with curiosity, but the demon had learned long ago that the angel would share only what information he chose to; and as Azrael offered no more by way of explanation, he didn't ask. With a gesture to say it wouldn't be a problem, he slid his chair back from the desk and lifted his voice to call, "Kharysa?"

Immediately a tall, slim girl dressed in the tunic and sash of the scribes pattered quietly from the record shelves to approach the men. Her hair was honey blond and her eyes a steely blue-gray, but unlike many of the dead souls that wandered here doing the bidding of the judges and the head-scribes, her cheeks were pink with lively energy and her eyes were clear. She was happy to be of service, which showed in the fondness present when she bowed respectfully to her overlord.

"Yes, Sir?" she inquired, awaiting her errand with a mild-mannered interest. When she glanced toward her master's visitor, curious to see a rare guest, her eyes suddenly widened. With a muffled squeak she performed a hurried second bow; one much deeper and less casual than the one she had offered Balberith. "I'm sorry, My Lord Shinigami—I didn't see you!"

Azrael smiled, nodding to display acceptance of the apology, regardless of his own opinions as to the overreach of formality in the Hellish court. Rumors of his being a hard man to cross were common, feeding the fear the damned might still keep for the shadowed figure that had dragged them through the Underworld. Such an attitude was only encouraged by the societal hierarchy of Hellish protocol.

He remembered this girl. She had been intended for Purgatory but had politely refused and immersed herself in the scribes' work. She was a plucky little thing, pretty, and very smart; she knew better just after a few seconds of interaction than to believe the gossip that Death was a cold, cruel creature. He appreciated even this small show of courage in his presence; it was far more than he often received elsewhere, or from his own ward.

With a single white hand he gripped the ache in his chest, as though he would very much like to rip the organ from his own body and cast it aside like a poisonous spider. Though he managed to suppress the pain from streaking across his face, all the self-control in the world could not prevent the tear of agony that splintered through his heart, spurred by the thought of Lilith. For a moment he recalled her face as it had looked the last time he had seen her, felt the throb in his chest, and nearly succumbed to the desire to curl up in the chair and close himself off from everything.

She had seemed lost, conflicted with the two desperately dueling facets of her self in regards to him; the one that accepted him and the one that screamed to get away from him.

To see her so afraid and so torn with no way to help was a jagged knife slicing into him. Over and over it ripped, cutting more deeply every time she looked at him with eyes that told him he would never have her trust, that she would never love him.

Even while blessed with an inhumanly high intellect and intuition, Balberith could only estimate what was causing the angel of death's eyes to whiten with pain. He paused before giving the adept the order for the documents, sending her off without answering the question in her retreating glance.

Balberith removed his rose-tinted spectacles as he leaned forward, his voice little more than a rustle of air as he inquired, "what's the matter? You look like you got on the bad side of Ouroboros during Mardi Gras."

Azrael swallowed thickly, forcing the echoing stabs of hurt back into the recesses of his consciousness. "It's nothing."

That wasn't what the angel's _voice_ said, but Balberith didn't press him. The secret of Azrael's condition was not unknown to him, and the scribe had heard from Mastema that the angel was having a difficult time getting a solid grip on the potential cure. Yet he left the matter alone, choosing instead to reach inside a desk drawer and pull out a scroll of parchment so old that it had been laden with numerous spells to keep it from crumbling to pieces.

"This might not be the best time," he said, holding it out to the angle, "but I just got it back from His Majesty this morning. Take a look."

Fingers closing gently around the plain wood rollers upon which the careworn material was secured, Azrael unrolled the document to spare the contents a quick, skimming glance. "Part of the Iscariot records…he only asked for the one scroll?"

"No, he still has the rest in his quarters. But take a good look around the middle section, the center of the fifth paragraph."

Rolling to the mentioned place, Azrael's eyes skimmed across the old writing. The lines of ink were preserved from the blur and fade of age, smooth grooves beneath the tips of his fingers marking the path of a quill pen.

_—__the __false __Christ__'__s __body __was __nailed __to __the __cross __by __Roman  
__decree, left until dead, upon which he was buried in the ground.  
__The disciple Judas Iscariot's body was discovered hung by the neck  
__until dead from the tree upon a cliff to the near east. Thus ended  
__the __third __attempt __of __the __Almighty__'__s __to __reach __out__—_

His eyes stilled; his hand frozen over the words where the texture of the parchment had changed. The pale tips of his fingers retraced the line, noting the subtle yet evident switch from smooth, aged material to something quite different. Alterations were common in documents of such an age, but this was not one of the patching spells used by the scribes when mending rent papers and to keep the records clean and legible. It was the texture of a completely different material; one that was very faintly etched with the sparks of a hastily hidden concealment charm.

The angel's brow furrowed, his face shadowed with suspicion and a burgeoning understanding of why the records had become a topic of concern. "You think he manipulated it?"

Balberith leaned closer still, tracing the tip of one ink-stained finger along the line of script. "I don't know what I think. I know that he's done something to it, but I don't know exactly what or why—he's covered the spells too well for the likes of me to penetrate."

The demon's rich brown eyes lifted to Azrael's face, the concern in them swelling swiftly as he examined the weariness buried in the pale angel's countenance. "I know you have a lot on your mind, but do you think you could pinpoint what His Infernal Majesty did?"

Azrael hunkered down until his nose nearly brushed the doctored parchment, reaching inside the pool of violet fire that bubbled within him and snagging a tiny tendril. Casting the thread of magic over the document's surface, he scanned for the magic that had been used on the letters beneath the shield. An instantaneous opposition flared into life before his search reached the suspected area, creating a fortified gate that barred his entry into the power it protected; a blocking spell, and a strong one at that.

The magical trace was most definitely Lucifer's, but the wards were too powerful to risk further examination just then. They hooked needle-thin claws into his mind, threatening to tear it from his magical strength if he proceeded and urged him to pull back. Retreating, he gave the warding spells a quick display of his submission to coax them into releasing his mental connection.

"The guards are strong, but I think I might be able to unravel them with time and assistance." Two fingers drew a sharp, horizontal line in the air above the parchment, allowing it to roll itself back around its mahogany frame. "Let's hope nothing more happens before I can do so."

"Amen to that," Balberith agreed with a sigh. He looked up to watch his aide come padding back to the desk with a thin gray folder in her hands, which he took with a murmured "thank you," and handed to Azrael.

The angel accepted it with a quiet smile of appreciation to the adept.

She bowed, "My Lord," and turned back to her work-master. "Anything else?"

"No, Kharysa. You're excused for the day."

She smiled, offered one final bow, and went to the desk that served as her workspace, a few yards behind and adjacent to Balberith's; no more than a tidy table kept in a much stricter order than that of her master's. She took her time arranging her pens and ink and sorting the files and folders into various categories to be dealt with later. From her sheer neatness, it was plain to see why she had been so quickly snatched by the scribes.

Azrael rose, scooping up the spelled scroll and the file of records. "Thank you for your help, Balberith. I'll get started on this when I can."

The king of the scribes frowned, delicately picking up his glasses and placing them at the bridge of his nose. "I wish I could say there's no hurry, but—"

"I know." The angel's exhale was long with his understanding. He turned to the girl with a gentle flash of gold and said quietly, "Asmodeus is on the warpath tonight, I think it would be wise for me to escort you home."

Her blue eyes were wide, watching him with a strange mix of apprehension, incredulity, and mild flattery, her mouth tilted with the hint of a smile before confusion masked it. "But don't you have a—"

The sound of Balberith clearing his throat stopped her cold, and she looked at him with questioning eyes to see him give the tiniest shake of his head. The subject she had tried to bring up was not open for discussion.

"I'm sorry, Sir," she apologized, her focus flickering from one man to the other.

The angel offered her a wan smile but said no more than, "are you ready?"

Kharysa grabbed a thin, black-bound sketchbook and trotted forward. "Yes, Sir."

Azrael sighed, the sound only slightly brushed with impatience as he remarked, "if I were to ask you not to address me with an honorific, would you?" He had never cared much for the amount of formality held in such high regard in Hell, finding it stifling and dry. While he played along with the undiplomatic values for the sake of keeping the peace, the overwhelming amount of bowing and scraping left a sour taste in his mouth.

"No, Sir," she answered, looking slightly bewildered.

A light chuckle cued Balberith's musing. "Impertinent little thing, isn't she?"

Answering with nothing but another soft smile, Azrael stepped back and led the way out of the Scribes' Nest and into the halls that led to the common dwelling area and the servants' apartments, Kharysa padding quietly after him.

His mood was pensive; certainly not the best kind to have when in the company of a virtual stranger, still chivalry had won in the end regardless of the variables. He could feel the girl's examination of him; her sharp eyes traced his face as she trotted to keep up with his swift pace, and knew that the cause for the attention was a touch of nerves. He was hardly surprised.

Yet she did not seem to fear him. That in of itself was an interesting thing, but as she shrugged off her anxiety and relaxed into following his lead, he acknowledged her abandonment of all-too-human suspicion of the unknown. Tired of fear as he was, her swift acceptance was refreshing. Not to mention rare.

Kharysa still watched him out of the corner of her eye, increasing her pace in order to get a better look at the shadows that slid along the angel's face. As an enigma, Death was intriguing to a human mind – one that understood only so much as its basest purpose – but as a living being, he was fascinating. To think that Death courted a _human_ just like she had been before she died!

They passed beneath a freshly lit sconce, the harsh light allowing her to better glimpse the subtle changes in his expression. An immediate stab of alarm snaked between her ribs like a penknife. He looked almost _ill_. It was difficult to differentiate the hard, weary lines from his otherwise perfect face and the dark swaths of shade under his eyes. Illuminated as the fresh fire made him, though, she couldn't miss them.

It was _unnatural._ An angel should not look sick or tired. This was a child of God, an ageless immortal with power beyond human comprehension. No matter what the reason, he shouldn't have looked like that.

"Are you ok?" She couldn't help asking, even as informal as the inquiry seemed. What business was it of hers if the Ambassador to Heaven was depressed? All the same, she didn't regret having done so.

Azrael turned his pale head to look at her, somewhat startled by the girl's outward display of concern. His answer came quickly, without thought, habitual with a politeness that was forcibly false. "Yes—" He paused and corrected, "no. I'm not."

Knowing that she was taking something of a risk, Kharysa braced herself for a response driven by temper as she added in a hushed murmur, "it's _her, _isn't it?"

Shrewd gray-lavender eyes flashed her way, but his steps never faltered as they passed the stone halls of the nobles' quarters. There was no reason to play ignorant to her meaning; she would have to be deaf and blind not to have heard at least a whisper of his situation. She had already tried to mention it once.

Balberith kept a sharp eye open for such listening skills when taking on helpers, they had use in retaining bits of gossip that often were useful in court or judgment cases. It wasn't all that shocking for her to have caught on to his fatigue and associate it with the hushed rumors that he was involving himself with a human paramour, with ill-fated results.

There was no graceful way to avoid the question, nor any reason to hide. Therefore, he answered her with a gracious, "yes."

"I'm sorry."

It was then that he stopped, startling her into freezing half a step behind, hit with an idea that he couldn't believe he hadn't thought up before.

She was a woman and a modern one at that, since her death had only occurred a brief two years ago. Lilith was of the same breed; young, spirited, full of ideals and opinions that differed from his older way of thinking. He knew he could be difficult, that his ways were old-fashioned and outdated when compared with the new-aged world to which his ward belonged. Perhaps Kharysa could help him better understand how he could help Lilith adjust to him.

"May I ask your advice?" he asked, turning to offer her a full-on gaze of violet.

"Sure," she said with a shrug. "I mean yes, Your Grace, but I don't know how much help I'll be."

He pointedly passed over the use of formality and proceeded straight with his question, his lovely voice smooth and slightly hushed. "Would you accept someone like me as a suitor?"

There was a pause as she tilted her head to the side, regarding him with a steady, measuring appraisal as she thought it over. He hid it too well for her to be certain, but she could swear she had heard a drop of desperation to the inquiry that was echoed in the way his eyes paled just the tiniest bit. She had told herself it was none of her business if he was depressed, not knowing how accurate the description had been.

His cool composure was streaked with hurt, anxiety and confliction, a ragged mixture of anxieties that, for all intents and purposes, could have been gnawing him to the bone. He wondered if the girl thought him frightening. He wondered if he was being overbearing. Most of all, he feared that the girl would find him too strange, too alien, to be comfortable. His questions were not hard to decode, not from the way the emotion flickered like a living candle in his eyes; as any man, he worried about the woman he wanted, terrified she would turn him away.

The great Angel of Death torn into pieces like this over a _woman? _No wonder Balberith had shushed her.

"I don't think it's really you that's the problem," Kharysa noted gently as they began walking again, "you're not that scary after a while."

The off-hand compliment was heeded with a weak smile. "I apologize for putting you on the spot," he told her, "I am not in the most stable of states right now. I should not have asked you that." He raked long fingers through his white-blond hair, the gesture a fortification against the constant swell of emotion as though he could force a layer of calmness to sink into his skull. "Lilith is smart enough to guess what I feel for her, but she has been so alienated by human men for so long that she no longer knows how to deal with them, or with me."

Kharysa processed this, and found that she felt some empathy for the girl she had never met. In life, she had only attempted to try a relationship with one boy, and it hadn't gone all that well. She had never been very comfortable around men and even now, surrounded by male demons and dead humans, it was a lingering trait that kept her a little shy and a little wary, despite all rationality or reason. It was impossible to define. That or it wasn't worth a definition. It was just there, a reminder of a hyperventilated reaction to a kiss or too-friendly touch.

While Kharysa wasn't sure how common such a thing was she could understand how under the right circumstances such a thing could be encouraged to increase. Perhaps even to the point where it was difficult to function.

Azrael's eyes softened, his apology still imprinted upon their color and depth when he murmured, "I suppose what I truly want to know is—as a modern woman—if you were terrified of men to the brink of paranoia, do you think you would ever be able to accept one again if he was able to prove that he truly cared for you…" He hesitated, and as she watched, he seemed to gaze right through her, seeing in her place something that held the deepest longings of his heart. The lavender of his eyes warmed with the barest hint of blue. "…that he would do anything for you?"

The smile she sent him was a little shy, but there was only honesty when she lifted her voice in answer. "Well, I don't know much about paranoia," she began slowly and thoughtfully, "But if it were me and if I knew just how much that man loved me, I'd do my very best to try and empathize, to try to get over it."

As they descended a narrow, twisting flight of steps which served as a rear entrance to the servants' wing of the palace, Kharysa hugged her book to her chest and squished herself against the stone wall to avoid knocking shoulders with a passing on-duty guard. "Any girl in her position might need a bit of encouragement, My Lord," she added, kindly, "You're an angel and that's intimidating."

His pale eyebrows lifted, incredulous. "Intimidating?"

She had to press a hand to her mouth to fight back the laughter that wanted to leap from her throat. For a Seraph he certainly didn't seem all that high-and-mighty; he seemed far too bookish and sweet to be the man who was rumored to have once shattered a killing curse with no more than a stroke of his hand. "Yes," she confirmed, pleased that her voice only wavered a bit, "intimidating." Her humor eased into reassurance.

"In my opinion, all you need is patience. Just keep showing her you care; since it's the truth, it shouldn't take her too long to see."

While he made no comment on either her assurances or the laughter he heard her swallow for the sake of his pride, he couldn't deny that his hopes had been bolstered. The throb in his deep in his chest seemed to have ebbed into little more than a dull ache. It remained as a reminiscent touch of hurt to prickle at his nerves, rather like the brush of something sharp that didn't quite make contact with flesh or muscle. In the place of pain there was only exhaustion and the faint blush of relief lifting its ragged head to sniff hopefully at the air.

The hall stretched out before them, deserted of all but the lit sconces along the walls. She was just about to bid him a good evening when he reached for her hand. The marble skin of his fingers glowed with the soft violet of warm fire and while it was faintly disturbing to see her hand burn, she felt no pain. It only itched in a way that was purely supernatural. Magic crawled along the bones in her hand and wrist, sinking into a substance that was more than just her blood.

"May you never need an escort again," he murmured, "only touch your palm and wish to go unseen, and you shall." He withdrew; tapping the tiny, elaborate cross-mark that now adorned the center of her open hand in what might have been no more than charcoal. "The spell will release only when you express a desire to be seen again, and it will neither smear nor wash away unless you wish it to."

Kharysa's blue-gray eyes widened with a speechless form of awe while she stared down at the little cross that marked her skin. She would be able to get to sleep on time now, unhindered by the lazy, greedy nobles that kept any passing servant hopping for the sheer fun of it – an occurrence all too common in those parts.

He had had no obligation to do this for her, and yet he presented her with such a useful, generous gift. Her memories of him had been faint and few, muddled by the strain of knowing she was dead and destined for Hell due to the double-manslaughter that had protected her sisters. What she remembered hadn't entitled to expect Death to be such a kindly soul. After hearing stories from the Rebellion and the righteous, Right Hand of God that had kept the banished demons at bay, his name had never dared to cross her lips.

And yet he had made two gestures to help and protect her simply because he had the ability to do so. He had escorted her home to keep her from the risk of running afoul of a demon noted for underhanded behavior and an inability to take a female's _no_ for an answer. He had adorned her hand with a version of the holy cross. _Her:_ a mere damned soul without the status or worth to appeal to one of the Arelim.

Clearly there was much, much more depth to this love-struck half-deity than was commonly known.

"T-thank you, Your Grace," she breathed, her gratitude woven into the words that spilled freely from her mouth.

"No," he corrected, firmly but gently, releasing her hand and allowing the trickling heat from his magic to gradually ebb away. Lifting his eyes to her face, he smiled at her with enough gratitude and appreciation in his beautiful face to make her heart flutter beneath her ribcage. "You have given me a reason to keep hoping. There is no way I can express the proper gratitude, but I can at least give you some peace and quiet."

Suppressing the urge to grin like a loony, she returned his smile (with restraint) and pointed to the second door to her right. "That's my room. Thanks for walking me, Sir."

The angel gave her a light, respectful tilt of the head as though tipping a nonexistent hat before turning to backtrack along the Dwelling halls. Her reassurances had been small, no more than the opinions of a human-turned-scribe, yet she noticed that his posture seemed straighter, taller, holding himself with the dignity that had been one of the few things she had remembered from her journey to the afterlife.

She was glad to see it.


	13. He Walks in Beauty

**Chapter 14  
**He Walks in Beauty

Recommended Listening: "Beautiful" by James Newton-Howard [From King Kong]

* * *

She had been chatting with Renae after her shift when it had come to her again. As light and discreet as it always was, it had flitted into her presence, piquing her attention like a whisper of mist. It slid in to check on her before easing away into empty space just when she had lifted her head as though to look for someone standing beside her. It was quite a normal occurrence, had been since she had been a little girl, but for some reason this time it had caused her a moment of panic.

The force of being – whatever it was – hadn't visited her for many days, bordering on weeks of abandonment. She had begun to think maybe it had been a figment created by her imagination and called out of her childhood dreams to watch over her, her way of coping by inventing something that cared. It had been a comfort during long, empty years; keeping her company at home and school, sitting beside her on the bench at the park, across the table where she sat with her piles of stories and fairy tales and dance magazines.

As adulthood had grown inside her skin, radiating outward, she had come to _know_ there were people who cared, she had friends and an uncle who loved her; there was no reason to substitute with an imaginary force anymore. But she had never really let it go. As though it had become a part of her subconscious, it had remained in her life when it shouldn't have.

Did that mean she hadn't _imagined_ it in the first place? If that was the case, who or what had been watching her?

She already knew the answer, didn't she?

Azrael's face – clear and beautiful as a photograph – held a prevalent possession over her mind, triggered by the mirror this sudden spark of memory had to his repeated intrusions into her life. A moment later she scoffed. There was no way that her imaginary Presence could be tied to the angel, it was just too convenient. But the longer she thought about it, the more difficult it was to keep to that assumed certainty.

There was something about him that was far too familiar to be ignored. Why else would she have felt so safe with him the very instant she had laid eyes on him, his arm at her back and her keys in his gloved hand? Why else would she have softened and trusted so quickly or easily? Why else would she have let him get anywhere near her?

A mixture of horror and awe bubbled at the back of her throat; a cry of shock, or perhaps of terror, attempting to squeeze itself from her lungs. All that time, all those moments when she had felt that strong, guiding energy lend her courage and comfort, it had been _him._

That day when she had begun her menstrual cycle for the first time, terrified and absolutely positive that she was dying, something had calmed her. What had felt like a warm, gentle hand had pushed her along in the right direction, and somehow she had wandered into a women's clinic where a kindly, sympathetic nurse had sat her down and explained everything.

Then there had been the time when her father had hit her so hard in the mouth that she had been sure she would lose some teeth. She had gone to sleep with tender gums, a bloodied wad of tissues on her bedside table. But she had woken to find her teeth straightened without any evidence of injury.

And last year when her leg had been broken, after being helped home by her friends, she had dropped into hazy sleep on the living room couch. She had been just on the right side of awake enough to feeling the strange, brushing sensation of invisible fingers pressing lightly to the damaged limb and resetting the bone without a trace of pain.

There were quite a few of these moments in her memory. Gentle flares of security and solace when she was frightened, reassuring touches from an unseen hand that steadied her when she nearly fell, shields that had seemed to separate her from the far-too-watchful boys she passed on the way home from school every day. She hadn't given it any serious thought, ignoring the abnormality of the real mark an imaginary force had made. But now everything made sense.

It had been Azrael that had watched her for all those years, _Azrael_ who had helped her, guided her and comforted her without ever showing his face, without ever once receiving a word in response to all his effort and care. He had told her the truth. He had told her _everything_, and in her ignorance she hadn't really believed him, shrugging off his explanations with all the coarseness of dislodging a leaf from her sleeve.

She should have been disgusted by the very idea…but why, then, did she find the connection somewhat sweet? Was it right for her to find the intimacy behind his determination to protect her – no matter how she felt about him – endearing? Could she possibly find it attractive?

_No_…no, that was taking it a bit too far. Surely she could be grateful without rushing into girlish silliness. It was stupid to think that way. Still, as she had trudged up the stairs to her apartment, shucked her shoes and bag, and retreated to the couch to sit and process, she couldn't quite shake how romantic all those little, loving gestures seemed.

Then, all of a sudden, she was absolutely livid. Anger shot through her system like an injection of adrenaline, mixing horribly with anxiety and resentment. So what if had protected her? Since when did she need a man to keep her safe? He regarded her with ownership, as though every little thing she did was his business and his alone, and then he had the _nerve_ to use his charm to make her think she might have withered and died without him.

How dare he use confusion to muddle her thoughts and play with her morals! How dare he use it to force his way into her unwilling arms.

It was infuriating that he would treat her like some sick, twisted cross between a child and a prize horse, locking her to that high shelf to keep her both isolated and artfully displayed in the same breath. She _loathed_ that arrogance; that syrupy, puffed-up conceit of a man who thought he was the best thing since sliced bread. All he could give her was heartache.

She gritted her teeth, her slight little jaw tense as she contemplated filling her hand with that silky hair and smashing his pretty face into a wall. The jerk. _Ooh,_ she would show him who was a weak, defenseless little girl. She would _show_ him that she didn't need his damn _protection_.

And yet all the accusations and rage fueled by her brain left a bad taste in her mouth. She really had almost hoped he was different, which was surely the only reason she could possibly feel guilty for thinking so badly of him. Regardless, the next time she saw him, he would get a generous piece of her mind to chew on.

What was strange was that she couldn't remember ever getting so angry with anyone else so quickly or furiously. What was it that emptied her of such strong emotions? Was it him; that infuriatingly superior attitude of his? But did it matter? He deserved her temper.

…didn't he?

How long had the phone been ringing?

She lifted her head from one of the couch's variety of throw pillows and slapped the mute button on the television remote, surprised that she hadn't heard it sooner. Rushing for the kitchen, she skidded across the slippery linoleum in her tractionless sock-feet, and half-sprawled across the counter to reach for the shrieking machine. "H-hello?" she gasped, catching her breath from the startle of almost tripping.

It was Sarah's voice that answered her with a cheery, "hey, Lili!"

"Hi," Lilith greeted habitually. She wasn't in the right mood to be social and polite at the same time, which was echoed in the very slight hardness to the edge of her voice. But Sarah either didn't notice or was determined to ignore it, for she talked on despite the less-than-enthusiastic welcome.

"Guess what," Sarah began, her volume consumed with the hush of someone bursting with a juicy secret. Lilith didn't answer, but she didn't exactly have to, for a moment later the redhead was squealing, "I have a boyfriend! I know I should have waited until work tomorrow, but I had to tell someone!"

This was not a surprising bit of news. Sarah went through beaus and romances like many people would go through pairs of shoes as a child during a growth-spurt.

As Sarah spilled the name of her new paramour, Lilith realized that she knew the guy. Mark was a tall, lean, brown-haired young man who taught honors English and served as the soccer coach at the school Sarah's younger sister attended. They had attended several of Angela's games last season, enough for Lilith to know that he was a nice, stable guy, the kind that might be able to balance Sarah's energy and fire.

Truly, she was glad for both of them. But at the moment, Lilith's enthusiasm was not pointed toward the favor of men of any breed. Waging an unsuccessful war against her righteous anger and a gruesome headache, she snipped, "why a boyfriend? You didn't do anything wrong."

Sarah laughed, "ouch! You're awfully grumpy today—maybe I should've let you sleep before sharing. Want me to call back tomorrow?"

Sighing rather mournfully, Lilith slouched onto a stool at the dining room side of the counter. Sour mood or no, she would listen and be supportive. That's what friends did. "Nah, it's ok," she reassured her friend. "Just because _I_ hate men doesn't mean you have to. Let's hear it." Yet while she braced herself for the downpour of happy girlish chatter on the subjects of how nice and cute and amazing Sarah's new fling was, it didn't come. The redhead was oddly quiet, and for a moment Lilith thought that the line had gone dead before Sarah finally responded.

"Lili, you have to grow into them sometime."

For a moment Lilith could only gape silently, her power of speech choked off by her surprise. Sure, Sarah was the most vehement of her friends when it came to attempting to set her up with a companion, but she had never been so blunt without the hint of joke or laughter. Right then, it was far too close to a parental command for Lilith to swallow.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Just that the chances of a pretty girl like you going her whole life without even _one_ boy are practically impossible. I just don't think you should be so negative about it. From what you told me yesterday, you at least _subconsciously_ want—"

"I _do__not_ want a man!" Lilith cried, sudden furious frustration causing her eyes to sting with the threat of tears. "I want nothing to do with them!"

She couldn't understand why Sarah was pushing her so hard. Nor, for that matter, could she understand the pure vehemence of her reaction. There was too much emotion, too much pressure beneath her ribs, squeezing her stomach between a pair of cold hands. She didn't want to talk about this anymore. How many times had she told her friends that she refused to loose her sense of self to some dog of a man? Too many times; she was sick of everyone harping about it.

"But _he__'__s_ different, you said so yourself—"

"For the _last_ time, I will _never_ end up like my mom, Sarah. So give it rest!"

With that, blinded by her frustration and her defensive rage, Lilith slammed the phone back into its cradle; hanging up on the first real friend she'd ever had.

She didn't know why she was crying. She _shouldn__'__t_ be crying; there was no reason to be, she had only been defending herself. But she had just hung up on Sarah – dear, caring Sarah who only wanted to help.

She stared down at the phone, breathless with shock and horror at what she had done, hoping desperately that the little green light would flick back on and the ringing would pursue her. But as the moments dragged by she came to realize that no light was coming and no tinny ringing split the silence. There was no Sarah calling back to stubbornly force her into listening, to hear her apology, to her tears. No friend to cling to in her time of weakness as she had so often done for Sarah.

But Sarah had never bit her head off like that, either.

Burying her face in her hands, Lilith worked to swallow her tears. She tried so hard that eventually the effort paid off and wet, hiccoughing sadness faded to sniffles. But with the absence of sorrow there was nothing but cold, hard anger left to gnaw at her insides like a living creature.

This was _his_ fault; all this conflict and this stupid, pointless confusion that kept at her like the plague. Now was the time to end it, once and for all. It was time to ask him just what he intended to do after he destroyed her life and sanity and everything that went along with them.

She sniffed, swiping the damp from her cheeks while she stood and set her mind to resolving this issue with the man who _claimed_ to be her guardian angel. More like some warped kind of keeper, turning her morals back on her. She didn't care if it would get him in trouble; she was no damsel in distress relying on the big strong man to shelter her from every little thing life threw her way. But how could she ask him anything when she had no way to call him? Could she make contact at all, or did he just choose to flit in whenever he chose?

Lilith glanced around the room, scanning the dining room and kitchenette, her green eyes landing on the steak knife set out to dry after being washed the night before. A blade; sharp and dangerous. He came when she was in _danger_. Threaten her life and he would appear.

It was a rash decision, but one that had more potential than simply yelling into thin air. So she crossed into the kitchen and snatched up the knife, her damp fingers scrabbling against the smooth countertop, and angled it so the tip of the blade was facing her. Taking a shaky breath, hoping that this would work without having to resort to causing herself actual bodily harm, she slowly edged the serrated point toward her chest.

"What are you doing?"

Her heart leapt into her throat. The knife went clattering to the floor when she whirled to face the strong, cotton-draped wall of Azrael's chest. He was looking down at her with one pale eyebrow quirked in mild curiosity; impressing on her the very important reality that she had neglected to count in her equation. The impact he made when standing there in full height and flesh, the power of his presence and the intensity of his gaze made her determination falter, a guttering candle in a summer breeze. She had forgotten the effect he had on her.

She stepped back a few paces, eyes downcast as she stammered, "I-I thought—I wanted to talk to you…" the explanations slipped into silence under the piercing weight of his heather-violet stare.

The angel just smiled, gracefully bending at the knees to pluck the knife from the floor and setting it on the counter. "That's all very well, but you don't need to put yourself in harm's way to get my attention." He reached out and took her hand in his, the tips of his long, elegant fingers smoothing over the tiny cut the sharp knife tip had made upon her palm when she had dropped it, wiping the blood away. The cut itself seemed to smooth away, as though nothing more than a thread had caught against her skin. "You are rarely out of my sight to begin with."

Though he had done away with the hurt, he didn't release her hand. He continued to examine it, tracing the lines and slopes of her palm with a tender, feather's breath of a touch. "Besides, it would be a true pity to damage breasts as lovely as yours."

Lilith's cheeks flushed but she squared her shoulders, intending to do what she had set out to and resolved not to let his slippery charms distract her from doing so. "That's just what I want to talk to you about."

"Your breasts?" he inquired absently, still studying her hand.

Her blush deepened considerably, her cheeks burning with a brilliant pink she hoped was hidden by her glare as she snatched her hand from his grasp. "_No!__"_

He gave her the barest of smiles while she rubbed at her hand to do away with the odd tingling that flushed across her skin. "I'm only teasing," he told her gently as she took a step back to widen the space between them. She tipped her chin to look up at him, her suspicion coloring the air around her with its potency, allowing him to catch sight of the silvery trails left by her tears.

The lightness in his expression tensed, all amusement replaced by a shock of worry which caused his eyes to pale with concern. "You've been crying…what's wrong? I will do everything in my power to—"

"That!" The shout was all her pent-up confusion, all the frustration that curdled in her blood, her interruption silencing him mid-assurance and inspiring the startled flush of magenta in his eyes. "_That_ is what's wrong!"

She glared at him, her green eyes flashing with a temper that seemed to consume her. "This chauvinistic male-dominance thing you have going on—I know it's you who's been watching me! You think I don't know how to take care of myself? You think you can just come waltzing into my life and tell me to leave everything to you, to give up my free will? I have worked _hard_ for my independence and I worked until my hands bled to the bone, which is more than I can say for someone who acts like nothing in the world can escape his meddling, like some spoiled child!"

The accusations flew, her tongue injecting the words with venom, just daring him to try to interrupt her. Yet he never opened his mouth, did nothing other than to offer his full attention, his eyes gray-lavender with genial surprise as he listened to her speech.

"I've had enough," she cried, clenching her hands into fists. "I am not some defenseless little girl—just because I'm a woman doesn't mean I can't be strong. I am my _own_ person. And if you think I am going to just let some arrogant stranger _control _me under the pretense of _protection_, then you are _wrong!_"

She took a deep, shuddering breath, her verbal whipping having run itself dry and succumbed to quiet. For a moment she felt nothing but a sweet swell of pride in herself and her ability to tell him exactly what she thought, but the flaming indignation that had spurred her courage was quickly dying down to a few smoldering embers. In the wake of her fury there was nothing but a still, chilling silence to fill the kitchen.

As she reflected on the things that had come from her mouth, she realized that several of those things had been lividly rude.

How could she have called him spoiled and arrogant? Of all the stupid, idiotic things to do, she simply had to go and insult him. He didn't look angry, but that didn't necessarily mean he wasn't. She forgot sometimes that he wasn't human simply because he seemed so very easy to be around. But he wasn't. This was not a mortal man with a mortal temper, he was powerful, formidable and the punishment he could deal out was sure to be much more than any human could ever give.

The silent, pitiful ruminations she made on her obvious death-wish offered her no comfort while she waited on tenterhooks for his retribution, for the rage, the blow of his hand. But nothing came, and when she once again dared to look up she was shocked to see the smile that had lifted the corners of his mouth.

"So _that__'__s_ what's been troubling you," he said, comprehension and understanding warming the cool bewilderment that had chilled his irises. "You think I have no respect for you."

He laughed softly and quietly, the belling tone completely empty of any touch of a condescending edge. "Lilith, you have a very strong will and I have lived among far too many strong women not to respect them. Many of the most formidable of my siblings—angel and demon alike—are female. Let us not forget also that God often takes the shape and presence of a woman."

While he hadn't meant this to chastise her, she felt ashamed of herself. Verbal abuse was never the right way to deal with a problem, and implying what he had never truly given her any reason to suspect had been out of line. She had handed him every reason (and right) to retaliate, yet all he did was patiently face her accusations with truth. Truly, she almost wished he had yelled right back at her. She deserved every bit of rebuttal he could give her. She was a feminist and paranoid, but that was no excuse for having abandoned her manners.

If there was one thing she was learning from these numerous episodes of foot-in-mouth syndrome, it was that he could make her lose her temper faster than anyone had ever been able to before, and make her feel like dirt for it just as quick. Hadn't she vowed _not_ to succumb regardless of what his response contained?

So much for that.

The palm of one ivory hand cupped her chin, tipping her face so that she was looking up into his warm violet eyes. "Women are not property. Never once in the span of my quite considerably long life have I believed that to be true, nor do I have any desire to control you. I deeply regret that I've made you feel inferior or oppressed. That was not my intent."

She squirmed under the weight of his gaze, feeling the shame mix uncomfortably with a small stab of appreciation for just how beautiful he really was.

"You are Lilith Isobel Gandion as long as you call yourself by that name," he told her softly, "But you are more than just a name, more than a subject to a poor father's lineage or a display of independence. You are a human being born with the gift of freedom. You rule your own will and lead your own life, and you will never be anything less than what _you_ choose to be. You are owned by no one and nothing." Very gently, his grip touched with a playful sweetness, he shook her stubborn chin. "I would be an utter fool not to know that."

"You said to—"

"I asked you to leave matters that might hinder your _safety_ to me," he corrected without even hearing her referral to the conversation they had had about his taking her dance partner's place. "Not your free will."

"But you—"

He touched the tip of his index finger to her lips. "A long time ago plague struck Europe—before the Bubonic was born—wiping out almost half of the population. I was collecting souls to escort to the afterlife." His expression hardened, memory causing his lovely features to stiffen and blank with a remembered sorrow. "It was a horrible time; even buildings seemed to wilt with sickness, dank with rot and decay…" he sighed and shook his head reminding himself to stay on track.

"I'd stopped on a street in northern France to make way for a gravedigger's cart only to overhear a woman's refusals to give up the body of her newly deceased husband to an undertaker. I had seen their young family a few times before, often enough to know that her husband was distant and cold to her, leaving me to wonder if he even knew he had a wife. Still, she remained unmoving by his side until she too died while trying bury his body with her own hands."

His hand slid from her face, leaving a trail of coolness behind where their skin had touched. She wondered how she hadn't noticed how cold his flesh was until the warmer kitchen air replaced the contact while he turned to lean against the counter's edge.

"Decades passed and still I questioned why that woman would so selflessly give her affection to someone unable, or unwilling, to return or treasure it." The smile that traced his mouth was wry. "It bothered me so that I arranged a messenger to ask her. According to him, she had simply answered; _because__I__loved__him,__isn__'__t__that__enough?_I was young then, and didn't understand. But it taught me an important lesson."

Lilith swallowed, having no idea what any of it had to do with her or why he had brought it up. Surely there was a connection somewhere. She didn't know him well, but she knew enough to understand that he was by no means unintelligent. "What lesson?"

His shoulders rose and fell in a mild shrug. "That real love is unconditional, without clear reason or definition. We can't put things such as love or courage into neat little boxes and label them so that we can always understand them. Such things were not meant to be cut-and-dry." With a soft smile he added, "They are beyond even the reckoning of the divine."

_What_ on _earth_was that supposed to mean?

Lilith didn't know what to think, nor did she know whether she should meet his speech with skepticism or applause for the artful way he wove language into song. Above all else, she was scared.

She had never asked for this. She didn't want his attention or his stories, no matter how fascinating or lovely, nor did she want to be singled out. He implied so much about the connection she was no longer stubborn enough to refuse. She knew very well why he had always seemed so comfortable and familiar from the beginning, yet whatever lay between them ran deeper than she cared to study, a depth founded in a question she couldn't answer.

_Why her?_

Her defense to unwanted attention had always been in becoming small and invisible, but there was no way to slide out of the radar when his focus was pinned so irrevocably to her. Aggression was the only fallback option that made sense. It made her voice hard and laced her tone with the bitter lash of human denial. "Aren't angels supposed to love everyone equally?"

While the sharpness struck at his tender heart, he knew it was not her goal to hurt him. It was a common mistake to make and he didn't begrudge her for it. All mortals knew of his kind was an assumed reputation as kind and caring observers, charged with guiding their charges away from danger and protecting the human race from the clutches of the devil and his kin. It wasn't her fault that there was no information for her to use to format her questions.

How was she to know the truth? Everything she could possibly have turned to for explanation he had contradicted, countering those sources with truths that made little or no sense to her rationality. Was she to believe the texts scholars, priests and thousands of people centuries though swore were reality? Or was she to trust the word of a scattering of strange, even freakish creatures that claimed otherwise?

"Not necessarily," he answered steadily. "We may feel compassion, empathy, understanding, patience for humanity as a whole. But the other kind of love is very rare, if it surfaces at all."

One dark eyebrow lifted. She tilted her face slightly to one side, giving him a look composed of a mocking irony. "And what's the _other_ kind of love?"

Violet eyes lifted, pinning her beneath his gaze. The beauty there was of a dark, ancient nature, composed of a power he couldn't hide if he'd wanted to. It seeped through the pale guise he wore on the outside to trap her in an iron cage cushioned with soft down pillows, leaking into the voice that was a brush of plum-colored velvet when he answered her.

"The kind a man shows a woman."

He held her breathless for a whole minute, deep, piercing eyes holding her captive to the unspoken wish that she look at him. Those eyes seemed to widen, expand to fill the entirety of her world, setting her free within a sensation of wonderful weightlessness until it was impossible to look away. Within the mirror of that look, even her slightly roomy jeans and modest cotton t-shirt were too tight and too revealing, because it seemed that he could see straight through them.

In more ways than should have been possible, she was naked to those eyes. And for one brief, infinitesimal moment she caught herself hoping.

It wasn't the first time he pinned the implication to his regard of her, but a flicker of doubt joined the tendril of warmth that coiled at the pit of her stomach. It was chilling, leaving denial and disbelief to fuel the shake of her dark-haired head. There was no reason to hope.

She angled her posture, exposing a cold shoulder to his watchful gaze. "What man would love me?" she muttered, not expecting any answer.

"I do," he murmured, the words so soft that she barely caught them before they faded into the quiet; delicate as the thin wings of a butterfly.

She could feel the breath hitch at the back of her throat. He couldn't have been clearer unless he had professed that awful, clichéd, three-word claim specifically; and for that reason it was harder for her to swallow.

She could have survived when there were only wordless implications to hint that he cared for her, instead of weaving a promise she knew he would only break in two. He wouldn't be able to help it; it was the nature of the beast. All the same, despite her certainties, she felt a small part of herself wilt beneath the weight of knowing that promise was just waiting to be splintered.

"I don't believe in love," she informed him, but the frostiness in her tone didn't quite cover up the bitterness of her disappointment. "Not that kind."

He laid the palm of one slender white hand against the surface of the counter, his manner cool and politely questioning and he pressed, "and why is that?"

"Because it doesn't exist," she retorted, "not that I've seen."

She crossed her arms over her chest, lifting her chin in a stubborn display of authority. Control was _hers_ today; no more allowing him to slip around her arguments, no more faltering under the calm, steady hand of an experienced debater. She was right, he was wrong. Just because he favored the renaissance-born affection for romanticism did not mean that he knew everything. Let him _try_ and pin her under again.

He seemed no more surprised by her argument than she was to give it to him; in fact, he looked distinctly amused.

"If that's true," he mused, "then how do you explain the faith so many people worldwide throughout centuries of time have put in it? Explain to me songs, books, stories, plays, and all else that are focused on nothing but immortalizing love. Why would so many people of differing belief systems, nationalities and social classes swear on their own _graves_ that love exists if it actually doesn't?"

"They're dreamers and idiots," she snapped, ruthless in her determination to win. His responding laughter smoothed against her like honey but she felt herself bristling like a vengeful cat, her hackles up as she glared up at him and his damnably handsome face.

"_What_ is so funny?"

While he continued to laugh, he at least found the manners to try and stifle it. The fingers of one hand pressed briefly to the firm line of his lips, covering the smile that curved them. "You are!" he exclaimed, patiently speaking over the infuriated, indignant gasp that burst from her mouth. "You have such an ardent defiance to what you don't understand that you trick yourself into believing that you don't _want_ to know."

Flustered and taken aback, she snapped, "what does that even mean?" The instant the words flew from her tongue she regretted them. He was giving her a look that made her long for the unwelcome laughter; almost skeptical, half pitying, his eyes swept over her with a tiny trace of shadow lurking beneath the marble angles of his face.

"There was a time when I felt just as you do now." His voice was low and expressionless, guarded against the torrent of emotion that might otherwise have been betrayed. "I believed love was a story conceived to give false hope and to please children, and—after a point—I wanted nothing to do with it."

Something in his eyes hardened, darkening the outermost ring of color in his eyes with a gray that was steely and haunted. "I grew cold and unfeeling, determined to close myself off from everything that might cause me pain. Soon I was hardly living any more. I was just…wandering, something less than what I was. Some time later, I found you and for a few brief years looking after you was enough to distract me from my useless grief until gradually I warmed to life again."

A small, inconsequential noise slipped from his throat, like a sigh born from a breath that didn't really wish to release it. "I don't think I understood what I felt was love until later. Either way, the love I felt was that of a caretaker—a father. I saw a little girl who had no one else to turn to and I cared very little for the fact that you could neither see nor sense my presence—"

"But I did," she blurted, before realizing she had interrupted him. "Sorry. It's just—there were a lot of times when I could feel something near me I couldn't see…" She stumbled over the explanation, hindered by the overly powerful awareness she suddenly had of his stare, the way his eyes had flushed with a violet so rich and pure that it seemed unreal. She stumbled until she gave up, finishing lamely: "I knew."

He seemed eager, delighted; the pull of the aura around him seemed to tighten with a sudden intensity that reached inside her and squeezed. Her breath was halted for a split second as she forcibly adjusted to the exposure to the angel's unrestrained joy. "Do you realize the significance of—" he bit the question in half before he could finish it, visibly calming. "No…never mind."

With a tiny shake of his white-blond head, he tucked the rush of intoxicating enthusiasm away. With it went the pressure on what she had thought was her windpipe, but proved to be several significant inches lower.

"I think I'd originally hoped I would be able to see you into adulthood and then I would be able to sever the attachment I had with you and let you live life on your own. _Au__'__wae._That wasn't meant to be." Discerning her look of curiosity and puzzlement at the use of the foreign word, he defined it. "It is alas, woe, misfortune. I use it here for dramatic emphasis to the point that my plans were greatly flawed."

Comprehension as blank as her expression, she repeated, "flawed?"

A wry, somewhat crooked smile tugged at the corners of his mouth, and for all her determination not to be attracted to him, she couldn't help the flutter of her heartbeat when her eyes fixed to the curve of those firm, beautiful lips.

His violet eyes flushed with a touch of blue that warmed both his mood and the room. They flickered down the line of her figure and back up to her face in a deliberate sweep, and she felt the tingling trail of that look as though he had physically touched her.

"I neglected to include certain factors in my initial equation. Adolescence for instance."

She gulped, suddenly very aware of him and the peerless elegance of his identity. The temperature of her skin elevated in a rising blush that spoke to the amused twinkle in his eyes, and she knew that somehow he had managed to turn up the intensity of his charm the exact moment her sensitivity to it had increased. All at once her senses were filled with him, him and nothing else. Her eyes fixed to the glory of his face, her lungs contracting to shorten her breath, her skin prickling with anticipation.

But this was impossible! Just moments ago she had been shrieking at him about her rights (she hadn't really liked yelling at him, when she considered it), and now she was back under her shell of timidity, cowering in the face of what he represented.

She had never been driven so weak by a male before; what made him so different? What was it about the way he looked at her that made her feel so good, made her feel wanted and beautiful? How was it possible that she could actually _like_ the shiver of enticement that ran down her back? This was not supposed to happen. She had handled hopeful advances well enough in the past, not counting the bit of nastiness involving Kevin, but she was way out of her league with this particular suitor.

Yet admitting it didn't protect her.

Suddenly the shadow in his eyes was very serious. He moved with a slow, languid ease that spoke of a cautionary gentility when he approached her, as though she was a timid deer. She watched the distance between them vanish with wide, wary eyes until he was standing directly in front of her, pressing at the boundaries of her personal space. Yet though she wanted to back away, she couldn't. He held her captive under the power of eyes that shone with a fire she couldn't understand.

One pale, calloused palm cupped her chin. Spellbound, she watched as he bent to bring his face so close to hers that she could feel the fan of his breath when he said, "I'm taking advantage of you now because I don't know when I'll get this chance again…and because you could use a good kissing."

In another instant he had tilted her chin upward with a slight jerk of his wrist; ivory lips pressing firmly to hers before she realized what was happening. He ignored her muffled squeal of half-hearted protest and swiftly stole the opportunity presented with the slight part of her lips to smoothly slip his tongue between her teeth, sweeping all thoughts of struggle from her brain in a single, melting instant.

She knew she shouldn't have allowed it, that she shouldn't encourage what she didn't really want. But against power like this she stood no chance.

His skin was cool against her mouth and warmed beneath her touch, the scent of it strong, clean and spicy, the taste beyond all the words she could have pulled from a dictionary. He was decadence, filling her with fire. Her soul sang; her eyelids fluttering, striping her vision with mascara, until they finally closed in helpless surrender. The better judgment screaming for her to shove him away was abandoned in favor of drowning in the pain of pleasure.

He pulled away so slowly that she was sure the suspense would kill her if the act itself didn't do the deed first. Their mouths partied as though they never wanted to be separated again. The pulse pounded in her ears, matched by the warm surge of blood that stained her face with a pretty blush.

God…_no_ one should be able to kiss like that; just one and she wanted to faint, it wasn't fair! It was so horrible that she wanted another – longer, deeper, more like the kisses he'd given to a half-traumatized girl lying across her couch.

Instantly she was torn, caught between wanting to push him away and pull him closer and having no idea what to do about it.

"There," he stepped back, the shadow of a smile within his eyes as he let out a trembling breath. The veil of control he wore like a cloak himself slid back into place, shielding her from the burden of the passion he hid. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

The tips of her fingers lifted to rest lightly against her own lips, which tingled with the pressure of his kiss. She felt dazed, lightheaded almost to the point of dizziness. The edge her mood had taken was hazy with an ironic amusement, confusion and frustration building beneath her flesh as though it had filled her bloodstream.

"No, but…" her whisper was pure uncertainty. Hadn't she just said she neither needed nor wanted him? But then why did a kiss make her feel as though she very well could? Was it the nature of such contacts to warp and twist one's predetermined morals like that?

Azrael's sympathy seemed to melt into the space around her, penetrating her thoughts as easily and efficiently as though she could swallow a spoonful of it. He reached out and very gently squeezed her shoulder. She couldn't hear his thoughts, but if she could have, she might have known that he understood her uncertainty and insecurity. She might have felt the guilt he harbored for pushing her as hard as he was.

Yet despite her denial he knew she was trying, even if _she_ didn't realize it. Her effort to accept him was phenomenal, as proven by her determination to stay in the same vicinity without sending him away, especially since her beliefs had been challenged and her arguments picked apart. She was standing her ground, and he admired her greatly for it.

"I know you don't quite know what to make of me yet, and that's understandable. But you should know that I want you to be _happy,_ and if that means accepting a decision for me to leave you and never return then I will respect it. But I will always love you," he added quietly, "whether you believe in it or not."

Green eyes wide, she stared up at him, frankly and unabashedly stunned. She hadn't thought she had a choice; that he was only giving her space so that she could become accustomed to the inevitable, that she could rage about rights and emancipation to her heart's content but her fate had been set in stone. But his words said otherwise.

He returned her stare without any hidden motives, his quiet gaze an open invitation for her to examine, search and comb for something she could use to ban him from her presence forever. It was a perfect opportunity. The only problem was that she couldn't spot a single thing. Perhaps it was her mind confused by an illusion of safety, but nothing within the angel's face, eyes, or posture told her that she would be better off with his absence.

Why, she couldn't know.

She didn't notice the soft tapping sound until he turned away, impossibly penetrating gaze shifting to focus on the living room window. The cause of the sharp clicks upon the glass was concealed by spotless white curtains, yet she had enough freedom of mind to offer the direction a curious glance. The remainder of her brain was still irrevocably stuck on the last words he had spoken.

_Whether you believe in it or not._

Azrael's face was impassive; his steps quick and soundless on the kitchen floor as he approached the window, completely lacking any reaction to the oddness of a tap to a second-story window away from any trees. In fact, he seemed eerily blank, as though all feeling had been wiped as easily from him as chalk from a blackboard. When he reached it, one snow-white hand folded the curtain back from the glass to peer outside it.

There was a soft sigh from the wind across the dark street, a series of sharp, tiny clicks against the glass, a brush of soft, yielding material. In the place of his emotionless mask, there came a flash of grim resignation and, beneath that, a sudden burst of eagerness. Two fingers lowered to the latch, flicking the metal peg from the notch that held it locked and allowed the glass to swing open on its steel hinges. His lips pursed, and from them rose a bright, thinly-sweet whistle.

Sweeping through the window – slightly clumsily for the lack of space – was the russet brown and rust red body of a red-tailed hawk.

The bird hovered awkwardly just inside the window, squawking indignantly while Azrael redid the latch and replaced the curtains to keep out the late-autumn cold. Finally the angel held out his left arm, allowing the hawk to delicately descend on the proffered perch. Ruffling its plumage in a show of temper against the offense of being made to wait outside, the hawk turned its regal head to preen one of its wings, ignoring the gentle stroke of fingertips to its breast.

Odd as it was to have a large bird of prey in a living room, Azrael turned from the window, returning to the tiny kitchenette as though nothing out of the ordinary had just occurred, a fond, slightly stiff smile at his marble lips. He glanced at Lilith's expression of intrigued shock and calmly explained.

"I am being summoned. Beelzebub only sends Anjay when he can't wait for a message-bearer, and as you can see," he gestured to the bird's scaly legs, "there is no message included. This means the words he has for me aren't necessarily safe on paper."

Lilith glanced toward the indicated area and noticed several drops of blood welling from beneath where the hawk's sharp talons gripped his wrist. "You're bleeding!"

He may have merely shrugged but his eyes were shrewd while he studied her. "Such small damage can be easily repaired. It doesn't hurt me."

She filled her eyes with the hawk's russet-red plumage, curiosity and appreciative fascination of the powerful creature striking her. He'd said Beelzebub used the bird to carry notes, but she didn't see the jesses and bells most captive birds of prey wore; not that she was an expert in Falconry, but she had watched a few bird specials on the discovery channel in her day.

"How does he know that he's a service animal? He's not jessed."

Azrael seemed pleased with the change in the subject's direction from the rights of modern women and the existence of love to the subject of the bird settled on his wrist. His eyes softened slightly and the slight strain that had come with the summons the hawk represented appeared to ease; leaving his answer to come with quite a cheerful note.

"He doesn't need to be leashed," he said. "Anjay is what we call _Kire__'__thael__—_roughly translatable to bound creature—an immortalized animal tied to the existence and power of the denizen who gave him eternity." The bird made a small warbling sound in the back of its throat as he bobbed his head up and down as though nodding assesent, clicking a cruelly curved beak. "His intelligence and knowledge are much greater than that of a common, mortal animal, so he knows his purpose and knows and respects his master…mainly, I think, because Beelzebub spoils him rotten."

The hawk gave him a steely, disapproving sort of glare and he chuckled.

Enchanted, Lilith lifted her hand, almost reaching before she had second thoughts and withdrew it slightly. Hesitant, she mumbled, "Is…is it ok to touch him?"

"Yes, but try to avoid looking him in the eyes. Too much eye contact is seen as bad manners or a threat to a bird." Slowly he lowered his arm, positioning the hawk within easy reach.

Keeping her gaze resolutely fixed to the hawk's wing, she cautiously extended her arm to brush the tips of her fingers to the soft, glossy feathers of the warm brown chest. The bird tolerated this for a polite moment before ducking his head, nudging her hand with the enthusiasm of an eager puppy until she consented to stroke the back of his head and neck. As her palm curved with the shape of the bird's offered spine and his burbling sounds of pleasure flickered at her ears, a shy smile lifted the corners of her mouth.

"He seems sweet for a raptor," she remarked, gently scratched the underside of the bird's throat like she would a cat's and noted that the golden eyes were blissfully closed.

"You could say that," Azrael mused. "He favors women over men, hence why he is so tolerant of you and treats me like the devil. Regular little libertine, just like his master."

She laughed at an image of the hawk bearing a silk top-hat and a fancy cane, strutting proudly down a street with his breast-feathers pompously fluffed. "Well he's certainly handsome," she complimented the bird, who continued to warble beneath her scratching. "All the lady-hawks must think he's just the finest thing since mouse meat."

The grin came freely and she looked up automatically to share the joke, almost forgetting that it was not Sarah or Janelle that she was conversing with.

He met her eyes with a smile of his own, his expression soft, placid, and tenderly affectionate; and at that moment, during that one swift, brief connection, Lilith felt at complete ease in his presence. Without any fear, confusion or anything else to disturb her, there was simply the pair of them together, sharing a moment of quiet amusement.

For the first time since she had been a little girl she felt the ice surrounding her rock-hard core of mistrust and anxiety crack. She simply gazed up into his face and felt a peaceful comfort wash over her as it had so many times before. As when he had been nothing but a nameless, bodiless presence guiding her to the women's clinic, setting her broken leg, and shielding her from the malicious intentions of the common street-thug.

Anjay gave a shrill little squawk under her hand and the spell was shattered. Frightened that she had hurt the bird's delicate bones, she swiftly withdrew, tearing her eyes from Azrael's in time to see the hawk snap irritably at the angel's thumb joint. The bite didn't draw blood, but it had left a shallow groove in his skin.

"You have to go, don't you," she said, surprised by the sadness that suddenly filled her at the prospect.

Once again, her morals and desires proved to be living contradictions of each other.

The angel sighed, and she couldn't help but note the touch of weariness to the softened sound. "I do—royalty calls. I apologize; we seem to get interrupted much more often than I would like."

She shook her head. "Don't apologize. I don't mind."

A grin flashed across his mouth; a stunning combination of white teeth and wickedly twisting lips. "Trying to get rid of me? You will have to work much harder than that, Sweetling."

"Oh, be quiet," she snapped, "You know that's not what I meant." But instead of feeling annoyed or flustered under his teasing, she felt curiously special.

This sweet, casual kind of flirtation had always seemed patronizing her in other people, but from his mouth it sounded as though he thought her worth pursuing in softer, gentler ways than any blatant statement he could have offered. It gave her a kind of courage, made her feel maybe her arguments _were_ a bit on the ridiculous side.

A thought made easier by his assurances that he wasn't _really_ trying to fit her in a neat little corner so that he could take her down once in a while to admire or play with like a doll.

His eyes shifted steadily, the shade reminiscent of a grudging need for haste. "I know. But I do have to go."

He took a step backward, but paused before turning from her, choosing instead to reach out with his free hand to brush that one stubborn strand of her hair back behind her ear. She caught the briefest whiff of apple as his skin whisked her cheek before he presented her with his back and stepped into the living room, where the hawk to spread its expansive russet wings with a quiet cry.

"Oh, and one more thing."

She leaned over the counter to regard him with polite patience, expecting some snippet of words telling her to stay safe.

"The next time you feel the desire for my company, I hope you'll refrain from the option of injuring or endangering yourself. All you have to do is call, and I will come."

She nearly choked on her gasp. While it had seemed logical at the time, she realized her own folly in attempting to mime her own harm and blushed rather spectacularly. Azrael's tone had been mild however, and she knew that he was neither scolding nor mocking her, merely informing her with patience and tenderness.

Azrael nodded once, settled his empty palm over the hawk's feet, gripping gently but firmly as he performed whatever magic he did in order to travel. In another moment he and the messenger bird were gone. But he had been sure to leave that calm, peaceful ebb of warmth in his wake to lessen the shock of being jerked into solitude, as he always did.

All of a sudden, though she couldn't have known it, that cracked ice slowly began to melt. For the first time in she didn't know how long, she recalled the face of a man with fondness.


	14. Requiem

**Chapter 13  
**Requiem

Recommended Listening: "Uninvited" by Alanis Morissette and "Decode" by Paramore

* * *

She woke to the sound of pounding rain, a series of awful dreams on her conscience and the bitter taste of guilt coating her mouth.

In her mind, she knew why her mood had sunk so low, but the rest of her refused to dwell on it. Every time she tried, she shut down, locked in the vice of denial until she turned her thoughts away; as though she had no choice but to reject the reality of what she had done. The heaviness of the truth veiled her eyes like sleep, but no matter how many times she tried to reason with it, she couldn't quite manage to address the guilt gnawing at her insides.

Not that she entirely wanted to; because in reality she knew she deserved the discomfort. But she didn't have the option of sulking all day. So she dragged her sorry self to work, head bowed, armed with an umbrella and sturdy waterproofed shoes against the downpour of Seattle's favorite weather.

It was just before her shift ended. She was trudging through the door to the room where the public copier, printers and fax machine were stationed; walking as though depression was a literal weight on her slight shoulders. And there was Sarah, having just arrived, refilling the black and white printer with paper. Their eyes had met, and Lilith had seen the flickering edge of negativity fade from her friend's face.

She had expected the redhead to give her verbal hell for treating her so poorly, but Sarah, it seemed, didn't find it prudent when the brunette looked as though she were hanging onto her sanity by a meager thread.

Lilith looked miserable; her hair limp and her eyes tired, a mix of hopeless uncertainty etched into the plains of her far too-pale face. Sarah took one look at the circles under her friend's eyes then crossed the bit of floor that stood between them and enveloped Lilith in a tight hug.

"Oh, _Lili,_" she murmured, the waver in her voice hinting at tears, "I'm sorry I pushed you, sweetie. Promise we won't do that again?"

That was all. Not a word about what had happened.

Lilith laid her cheek against Sarah's shoulder and nodded, clutching at her as though terrified the other girl would disappear if she let go. Even though it had only been a day, she couldn't bear fighting with Sarah. It just…hurt.

After that, things weren't as bad, but she still felt as though she was staring into the mouth of a cliff. Some insecurities couldn't be healed with a friend's love. She didn't want to think about how ugly she was turning out to be. Even when her shift was over, she stayed simply for the sake of having company. She didn't want to be alone with the nagging barbs her conscious kept sending her with scathing tones; the loathing was almost unbearable.

Sometimes she was fine, when Sarah had a few moments and sat in the staff room where she had been reading to chat during her break, or April, their boss. She would smile and laugh, if faintly; but when she was left to her own resources, she found that her thoughts took her to dark places she didn't want to be. But other times, she could tell the worry and self-criticism betrayed her to her coworkers.

She knew she got some concerned looks, but she tried not to pay much attention. Sarah probably assumed the whole problem was some manner of conflict related to the man she knew as _Adrian,_ which was probably what everyone else thought too, considering how gossipy the redhead was. It was ironic that they were absolutely right without even realizing why. But she didn't want to think about him or the tension the thought of him strung through her bones.

All too soon, it was closing time, and despite her desire to cling like a parasite to her work-family to avoid being alone, she left them with a smile to return to their families.

Even with the return of her closest friendship, the weight on Lilith's back felt as pressing and awkward as it had before. She wandered idly down the street, bent on trying to figure out _why_ the thought of returning home alone was such an unhappy one. Shouldn't she want to go home and rest? She had never feared her sanctuary before…when had she begun to fear it at all?

But that wasn't the real issue. Another thought was prickling at the back of her mind, telling her that something wasn't quite right, that something was wrong.

The premature winter twilight cast deep shadows over everything it touched, an extended blackness cutting through every angle, making normal, pleasant things seem sinister. The scrapes of a spindly tree branch against a nearby wall caused her to start and bristle like a frightened cat. Shivering, she watched the skeletal fingers of the tree's naked branches sway, unsure why she had thought it was the steps of someone trailing behind her.

She didn't quite know why she was suddenly so afraid. Surely if anyone was following her, it would be her guardian come to see her safely home. But she knew what the angel's presence felt like, and she should have been calmed – even perhaps against her own will – if he had been near enough for her to hear him.

This was _not_ her guardian.

She ascended the stairs to her apartment with a little burst of speed, ears strained for the sound that persisted in her wake, hoping she had been mistaken. But there it was; the quiet, subdued thud of rhythmic footsteps. Her panic spiked, sent her flying through her front door and urged shaking hands to double-bolt the door behind her.

Every shadow was monstrous, hell-bent on keeping her in the open to be devoured by her waking nightmares. She imagined she could see faces twisted with snarls of the depraved, that they snapped at her with sharp teeth, red eyes burning with evil stars.

It was creepily like the old Disney version of "Snow White;" preexisting fears turning harmless things into dragons and casual sounds of the night into screams of predators. Only, in Snow White's story, there was good reason for that fright to have been there in the first place. Snow White, at least, was running with the thought of her stepmother's wishes for her death, wondering how on earth she was going to stay alive.

Lilith was just panicking for no real definable reason. Obvious, because when was the last time she made a reference to a fairy tale? And why? Because if there were angels, there must also be demons.

Great, hulking things towered in her mind's eye, aided by the shift of shadows across her floor and walls. Things that leered, reaching out with evil claws and dripping fangs, with rotting flesh and snarls, seeking to strip her of skin and devour her organs or weave ornaments from her hair and nails.

When she managed to stagger down the hall, skirting the kitchen, she turned and fled for her bedroom. She scrabbled for the knob with feverish, trembling hands, tears streaming down her cheeks to stain the collar of her sweater dark.

Slamming the door shut behind her, she took a running leap onto the very center of her bed, unwilling to deal with whatever horrors were lying in wait beneath it to snatch at her and drag her into some shadowy underworld. Crawling backward, she pressed herself against the headboard. Her eyes flickered to the corners of the room, taking in the messy sprawl of blurry, oddly-shaped furnishings and piles; indefinable horrors in the dark.

She whimpered, scratching at the paint covering the wall as she clung to the wood at the head of the bed, grappling with a thick wool blanket until it covered her cowering, shivering body.

Spluttering and crying, she huddled in her corner; hugging her knees to her chest and trying in vain to wedge her face between her arm and the wall, praying for the nightmare to end. If only there was something she could think about, something she could use to distract herself from this garish hell her brain had forged for itself.

And then she remembered.

_He_ could take the fear away; whether if it was the terror invoked by a threat of bodily harm or simply battling the cold trying to slip under her skin. He could protect her even from her own silly fears. As she huddled desperately in her nest of blankets, pressed against the headboard, she wished he _was_ there beside her so she could feel the cool marble of his skin and know that nothing was going to hurt her.

What was it he had said? Something about what she was to do if she needed him, but what had it been? To _call_ him.

But how was she supposed to do that? He was nowhere near enough to hear her no matter how loudly she screamed. It was impossible for her voice to reach across the distance that was sure to be between them. What had been the point of telling her to do such a thing? She could see no way to receive his comfort beyond his appearing at her side and touching one of those long, pale hands to her face.

But what if he'd meant something completely different? She had always felt connected to the Presence he had been all throughout her youth, was it possible to use it to contact him? It was such a ridiculous idea that if she had been any calmer she would have thought herself an idiot for imagining such an outrageous thing. But as frightened as she was, she didn't see it as she might have. Instead, she hugged her arms more tightly around her torso and she considered how to go about accessing such a pathway.

It was as though her desperation made the pathway clear. Or perhaps it was her need that filled with him, veiled her eyes with the memory of his watchful eyes, soft voice and even softer touch. There was nothing but him.

Thousands of emotions raced through her; apprehension, anxiety, joy, grief, confusion, happiness, resentment, delight, relief, all mixed and swilled together. A flash of light burned into brilliance, momentarily blinding her as white sparks burned into her eyes, and when she could look again, a picture had replaced the shadow-warped scene of her bedroom.

The angel of death sat with his profile to her; his eyes lowered to the surface of a table strewn with sheets and sheets of white paper, lips moving as though in speech, though she could hear no words. Deep shadows cut hard lines beneath his cheekbones, causing him to look harried and stressed, as though he would rather be anywhere than where he was. His eyes were cool and distant, but at that moment she couldn't have cared less.

Seeing his face calmed her. It was as simple as that.

Suddenly his head lifted; his eyes darkened to the shade of curious violet as he turned slightly as though searching for something. A smile flickered across his lips, a beautifully, bemusedly stunned sort of smile teaming with affection. She felt a gentle touch to her forehead, a brush of what felt like fingertips stroking her temples in a brief message of reassurance. _I am here, _it said, _fear not. _

Comfort bloomed like ink across white paper, soaking up the stark whiteness of her fright and staining it with the serene and welcoming black not of unknowing anxiety, but of sleep. _Be still,_ the whisper bid her. _Sleep, nothing will harm you. Sleep…_

She slumped sideways, a heavy thump of fabric and hair cuing her descent to the pillows. A flutter of eyelids shaded glazed green irises, dark lashes settling like black lace over the slopes of her cheeks.

She would never realize just how unnaturally quickly she had fallen asleep. Nor would she realize that while she had not been tired at only half-past seven, while she had dozed off in her jeans and sweater, her hair still up; it had been his voice sending her headfirst into gentle dreams. She wouldn't even remember the state of unnatural terror that had scared her into calling on him in the first place.

Only hours later would she wake and wonder what on earth had exhausted her enough to make her fall asleep in her clothes, knowing only that his face had been in her thoughts.

...

Azrael shuffled the pile of papers spilled across the meeting table, deft fingers scooping up the files and documents from his report with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. "As for the conflict in Israel, political strife continues to perpetuate unrest. I foresee no approaching end to either."

He set aside his papers and looked up, the cool lavender of his eyes nonchalant and serene as he returned the gaze of the faces turned his way.

Private meetings among the Seraphim occurred once every mortal year, but while they were a necessity, they were not truly enjoyable. The six oldest immortals that still resided within God's good graces were not similar as their cumulative rank might have implied, despite the fact that they were close as siblings. From age and temperament to coloring they varied as widely as any number of human races. And from too much variation conflict was sometimes born.

In general the Seraphim enjoyed one another's company, affectionate and loyal as brothers and sisters should have been. They were an unparalleled force that could break down any resistance that opposed them. Powerful and noble, they had seen history written, crafted time and magic and culture, but they had never been – and never would be – perfect.

They had been originally created for companionship to form a society that dwelled in peace and harmony, intended to run in forests and fields beneath the skies. Being cramped in one of the smaller meeting chambers of the Citadel for the better part of several hours did nothing for their moods.

Then there was the news that Lucifer had manipulated the historical records of Balberith's library.

The idea that their oldest and banished brother might be planning another uprising draped a dark shadow over them all, and the freshly sharpened edge to the mood in the room was not a very calm, relaxing, or comfortable one. As the last to report to siblings already tired of being stuck in a small room without the freedom of air and space, Azrael was very painfully aware of it.

"Are you _sure_ you don't need any assistance?" Raphael leaned slightly forward, his soulful brown eyes solemn with concern as he regarded his younger brother. From beneath tousled hair the color of rich sage, he met Azrael's impassive face with an expression that said quite clearly the healer could read the weariness in his bones.

The question was edged with the flavor of an old argument; one that had been tossed back and forth for years. Raphael was tender hearted and loathed any hint of pain or suffering. Like a dog could smell fear, Raphael could sense discomfort, ailment, and exhaustion, and any one of them urged him to pursue treatment. He had never made a secret out of his disdain for the workload his brother had to carry.

Azrael's nod was sincere, but he did not have the smile that was customary response for such a question. Usually he found the persistence to be amusing. Not today. "I'm sure," he answered. "The numbers won't stay high forever. But thank you, just the same."

Unsatisfied, Raphael's eyes flickered toward white-haired Gabriel.

Gabriel was built upon extremes. As his face alternated between the illusion of infinite age and peerless youth, sometimes he was cool and mild to the point of indifference while on other occasions he would explode with passion and emotion. Just then his pale blue eyes were drawn with the haze of worry as he returned Raphael's glance.

Worry was no stranger to this circle. They had been treading lightly around him for years now, as though terrified that he was going to shatter under pressure if they so much as spoke too loudly. It was driving him mad, but he understood they only meant him well, and kept his impatience with their coddling to himself.

In his turn, Gabriel shifted to look at Uriel, a dark, imposing figure cloaked in shadow that haunted the other end of the circular table, almost as if he were asking the older being to assert authority and force Azrael to accept the offered help. Yet it was not stoic, formal Uriel who interjected, but Michael.

Michael was all his element implied; fire and vehemence, famed for a scalding attitude and subtle, cold kind of arrogance. When the warrior's voice ended the momentary silence, it cut like a hot knife. "Don't be a martyr," he said, sitting upright and firm in his seat with one hand against the table. "We know you need the help, so _take_ it."

Enoch took in a short, harsh breath. Her eyes, dark and bright blue rings intersected by one of rose pink, widened as she stared at Michael in heated disbelief. Raphael fidgeted and Gabriel looked unsettled. Even stoic Uriel reacted, his brow creasing as his fathomless, impenetrable black eyes bored into his golden brother's smooth, self-sure expression.

Yet Azrael merely met the molten gaze of the Warrior with one of pale lavender. "You doubt I can handle my own element, Michael?" he murmured coolly, voice almost literally crackling with frost. "I assure you, I am by no means attempting to be a martyr of any—"

Suddenly he stopped mid-sentence, his voice cut off as neatly as if he had been gagged.

The tingling at the back of his mind – the one he had initially mistaken for weariness – had turned out to be something much different. It hadn't been a summons, but it was so close to one that it floored him; a touch of a presence so familiar that he hadn't noticed at first, and stole his breath when he did.

Enoch glanced at him as though to ask if he was going to finish his chastisement or whether she was to do it for him. But her brother was no longer paying any attention to his surroundings. His pale eyes were misty; hearing something that none of them could, locked in a world outside of the range of their senses.

At first she thought he was merely daydreaming, and she almost reached over to shake him out of it until she noticed the set of his expression. The tense lines of concentration etched into her older brother's face had gone, replaced by a genial, gentle surprise. When a soft, tender smile softened the corner of his mouth, she understood what had distracted him.

Less than pleased with being set aside, Michael's eyes hardened with a cold glitter, jaw tight as he began stiffly, "Azrael—"

"Shh!" the Metatron hissed, her eyes still fixed to her twin as his purple eyes flushed dark with color.

Happiness spread through her, warm and tingling. She knew now for sure. That shade of blue only came to his eyes when he thought of his mortal charge; the girl that would save his life.

He turned to her then, his eyes still focused far away as he whispered, "she reached for me, _sera'hia_…_she_ reached for _me._"

Her hand slid across the table, her fingers closing briefly around his wrist to give it a light squeeze as she smiled at him. Gradually he began to find his way back to the meeting room, and his smile widened, affectionate as he looked down at his closest sister.

Gratitude lined every edge of his face and she knew it was for her. It was no secret to him that she had played a crucial part in his being pushed into Lilith's life. Enoch had only wanted him to be happy; her smart, compassionate, tragic brother who so deserved to be loved and cared for. She hadn't wanted to lose him to the iron claws of his despair.

The sound of Michael's fingers tapping lightly against the arm of his chair jerked them from the shared reverie. "If you're finished," he said tersely, "may we get on with the report?"

Azrael's eyes paled as he met Michael's gaze for the second time. The stare was long and tense, and undoubtedly, if they had both been dogs, their lips would have been pulled back, teeth bared and snarls ripping at their throats. But this was to be expected. Of the Seraphim, Michael had the worst and quickest temper and Azrael was right behind him. They were always snapping at each other, irritable and vicious.

It seemed that Azrael was about to retaliate, his eyes flashing and his mouth a firm line.

Always the diplomat, Uriel spoke up. His voice was reminiscent of stone and hoarse wind, quiet and smooth, dark and endlessly spiraling like his eyes. "Perhaps we should continue this session another day?" He glanced toward Azrael, the slightly more sensible of the two, his deep eyes inquiring as much as disapproving.

While he hesitated for a moment, Azrael's mood wouldn't allow him to retain anger for long. The small victory brought by Lilith mentally reaching out to him for comfort when she had been afraid placated him even now. "No," he refused softly, "there's no need. My report is concluded as much as it needs to be."

He rose, gathering up his papers as he did. "I believe I'll turn in for the night, if you will excuse me?"

"Rest well," Raphael murmured with a smile. He had caught on to Enoch's understanding and shared it. Uriel lifted a single hand to give him a small wave, which was acknowledged with a nod. In another moment Azrael had swept gracefully through the door, exiting the chamber as swiftly and silently as his immortal grace allowed.

A trembling cloud of joy filled the tiny meeting room, swelling to a level that nearly burst. The three younger angels exchanged glances that teamed with excitement, hardly able to contain their elation. After months of frustration, anxiety, and cycles of despair, Azrael finally had something to show for all his care and effort.

Perhaps it had been against her knowledge, but the girl had willingly reached for him in loneliness or distress. Azrael wasn't likely to invent such a success, especially since he had been dragging his feet for the better part of two weeks. Steadily, surely, Lilith was drawing closer to her voluntary guardian angel. And they, as his siblings, were beyond happy for him.

All but one.

Michael, having caught on to the subliminal messages flying around him, had adopted an expression of coiled, tight-fisted fury. "You mean to tell me that he's still fraternizing with that human?"

The other four knew very well that Michael, never having approved of the idea of his brother being romantically involved with a mortal, had approached Azrael in attempts to force the younger angel's compliance. He believed that while such crude relations were good enough for humans, it was sinful for any angel to accept it for himself. The idea of one of the Seraphim involved in such a way was atrocious.

They knew Michael saw Azrael's refusal to heed him was a personal slap in the face. But they also knew that the best solution – especially to keep the peace between them all – was to leave him for Azrael to deal with. The angel of death was quite capable of handling himself when it came to Michael's temper tantrums.

However, considering how worn Azrael had been lately, it was a common thought between them to dissuade Michael from approaching him again so soon after such a great (yet still so small) achievement.

"I would hardly call it fraternizing," Uriel mused, his tone rather dry, "to do as ordered."

"Ordered, _hah!"_ Michael sneered. "Ordered to _what_, throw himself from the heavens? I think not."

"We've been through this," Gabriel's tone was a silken murmur, quiet and thoughtful. "Several times, if I remember correctly. Azrael is within his rights, which you know this as well as we." His pale gaze pinned the temperamental warrior in place for a long, uncomfortable moment strewn with hollow silence.

But Michael was not interested in Gabriel's blood. He was after Azrael; for it was Azrael who had been bathing himself in sin and it was Azrael who would pay for it. He stood, rising to his feet with a ripple of white fabric, moving to follow and confront his youngest brother. "I've have enough of this—"

"And _I _have had enough of _you!"_

Michael froze, the peregrine feathers at his golden-mahogany nape glinting gently as his head turned to stare at the sister who had leapt to her feet to glower at him, her eyes alight with such intensity that she might have sought to burn a hole right through him. Enoch's slight shoulders were squared, jaw set, her hands at her hips while she glared at him, deadly serious. As the Voice, Enoch was not the most proficient or skillful of fighters among them but was powerful in her own ways. She too had been made to fight for what she believed in.

"You have no right to question, _Michael,_" she snapped, her anger sharp as a flint at her sweet, melodic voice. The molten irises of Michael's eyes flashed with temper, but Enoch held her ground. "You leave him be, or so help me I'll go straight to Mother."

He gave her a look, a calculating, measuring look, as though wondering whether she would really follow through with her threat.

"Don't think I won't," she stuck out a hand, the long line of her index finger stabbing straight at him as she let the words melt into their hearts.

For a time, Michael merely stared back at his sister, expression blank, closed of all thought and feeling. Then, with a show of rolling his eyes and muttering, "on his own head be it," the warrior sat back down.

Tense muscles eased, wariness relaxing as the other four Seraphim happily turned their attentions away from the matter. They gathered up their things amid idle chatter about the affairs of their fellow angels. Yet Michael remained strangely silent, his attention on the closed door, golden eyes narrowed with dislike as he dwelled on the mortal woman corrupting his brother; gutter trash dripping poison in Azrael's ear.

...

Loneliness was a plague. Like a cancerous virus, it settled and multiplied, spreading to new ground, corrupting and eating away at all the happiness that could have lived in its absence. A parasite that thrived on despair, it was discomfort that gnawed at stomach and heart. Yet unlike the virus of an illness or disease, loneliness could not be fought or destroyed by a dosage of Aspirin and a swallow of water. Corrosive as acid, it would eat through any drug she tried to treat it with, even if that drug was the company of her closest friends.

She sat motionless at her computer desk, the surface piled high with books to be scanned and turned into holds; her hands were frozen in her lap, her eyes glazed with thought as she stared at the screen. The only thing that moved was her teeth, worrying her lower lip while the rest of her remained in stillness.

Lilith supposed that it was the loneliness that caused her mind to wander, and that she was looking for a solution to a problem she didn't really want to face head-on. But there was another part; that separate, treacherous piece of her which said that nothing she did would ease the unsettling feeling of isolation haunting her like a half-vanquished enemy.

There were her girls, but Lilith knew that there was no hope for getting together with any of them. Sarah had her new boy; a boy who seemed to truly care about _Sarah_, and deserved some time with her, which Lilith couldn't argue with. Janelle had competition rehearsals all weekend, and Alice was on vacation in Portland to visit with her long-term beaux's family.

There was only one thing to do.

While half of her whispered that perhaps this was not the best way to go about curing her desire for conversation and company, the other half quite calmly shoved the first half's face into a pillow to shut it up.

Almost wistfully, she recalled the ease she had felt when he had soothed her fanatical tirade about independence and self-sufficiency. She remembered that when she had looked into his eyes, her fingers buried in hawk feathers, she had seen a protector and a friend. What if, despite herself, she had also seen him as something else as well? And now, wanting comfort and unsure how to find it, she wondered if maybe – just maybe – she could find that sense of gentle companionship again.

The whole idea was a crap-shoot and she knew it, but she also knew it was futile to fight the call of inspiration. She was willing to try.

Unsure what he'd meant by _calling,_ she was reluctant to start spouting off a summons to the empty air in the staffroom of a public library. While the room was currently empty, she would probably look fairly crazy if someone happened by and realized she was talking to a wall of lockers. She figured if it didn't work, she would chew him out for it later.

Glancing cautiously over her shoulder to make sure that she wasn't overheard, she called softly, "Azrael?"

Nothing happened. Not a sound pierced the air, not a single scrap of paper shifted; nothing at all spectacular or mysterious to hint that she had been heard.

Mildly discouraged, she contemplated that perhaps she wasn't going about it the right way. Was there something she wasn't doing? She vaguely remembered the feeling that she'd had the other night, when she had unconsciously reached out to the man that hadn't been anywhere near. She had sought the familiarity of his presence, and when she had let her mind and body settle into the recollection of his being, she had felt him reach back to her and give her reassurance.

Maybe focus was the key. Slowing her breath and pushing every other scrap of doubt or frustration out of her mind, she focused on the face that had been burned into her brain since she had first seen it.

This time, something was different. She could see him, pale, sharp, and clear; every point in perfect detail. He could have been standing right in front of her, a gentle smile curving his mouth as he tilted his head to the side, quizzically puzzled, asking for clarification when he hadn't quite heard her.

It was not sketchy or slow like a dream but still she felt detached from it, as though they were separated by some kind of paper-thin barrier that she couldn't push through. Instinctively, her lips parted. Between slow and easy breaths she felt her throat work and sound slip away.

"Azrael?"

And this time there was recognition. Somewhere a pale head lifted, thick black lashes fringing violet eyes, a strong hand brushing a tendril of hair behind the curve of an ear. She felt a flurry of movement and a coolness breaking across her face like the popping of a bubble. Then—

"Yes?"

She whirled around, clapping a hand to her instantly pounding heart. "_Jesus!_" She squeaked, "don't you make any _noise_ when you do that teleporting thing?"

Looking calmly back at her, a hint of amusement playing at the edge of his mouth, he lifted a hand in a placating gesture. "My apologies. I didn't mean to startle you. Did you require assistance with something?" He glanced toward a cart stacked with boxes of donated encyclopedias, not quite managing to conceal his uncertainty as to why she had called him. "Heavy lifting, perhaps?"

With a delicate sneer, she retorted; "Aren't you a bit too pretty to be offering?"

Azrael grinned, pleased that she had met him with humor. "_Touché,_" he complimented, "though I am flattered you think me pretty."

She did her best not to blush. There was no point in denying it, because he was most certainly more than merely pretty, but she had thought he'd known her opinion on that subject already. Perhaps, like for her, there was a different value in being told straight up rather than gauging reactions.

Swallowing thickly, she cleared her throat and bolstered her confidence to bring up the reason for having summoned him. "Um, I saw a flyer for the S.A.M. in the paper this morning—the Art Museum." Her fingers worried at the hem of her blouse, her downcast eyes cast fixed on the smoothly shined toes of his boots. "There's a special on the exhibit from the Louvre this afternoon…"

His fingers slid beneath her chin, tipping her face upward and with it her gaze. "Never lower your eyes to me," he told her quietly. "You are not inferior to anyone, least of all someone vying for your affection."

She wasn't quite sure what to make of this statement, strung somewhere between encouraged and embarrassed. But she met his gaze nevertheless. His eyes were blank. This surprised her, for she couldn't remember seeing them so absent of feeling before. It was almost as though he had shielded himself, like his veil of control had thickened and iced over to protect him, cautious as he watched her for further explanation.

And yet he watched her so intently. He could have been trying to look into her head and read the wishes written in her mind. Which – she realized – perhaps he was.

"I just wondered if maybe…I understand if you're busy, but I thought I'd ask—"

She knew she was rambling, knew that she probably sounded like a twitchy teenage girl trying to ask her handsome lab partner on a date. Yet after a moment of floundering, she decided; _to hell with it._ Her pride wasn't worth much, so what difference would it make if he refused?

"—if you wanted to go with me?"

His smile was the bright, surprised expression of the flattered as comprehension arose. She wanted an outing, and she had sought companionship_._ The realization knocked the unneeded wind from his lungs, and he wrapped it hastily in a firm but tender mental grip, terrified that it might slip away.

As well and deeply as he knew her, whatever motive she might have had for this sudden active interest in their relationship stumped him. Yet the fact remained that she smelled of unwanted solitude, that she could have gone to any of her friends had she merely wanted company, but she hadn't. She had sought _him._ What was more, she had looked into something she thought they might enjoy compatibly. Perhaps that effort had been unintentional, but did that truly matter?

It crossed his mind that the whole thing could be a ploy to uproot some flaw she would use to exorcise him from her life. Knowing Lilith, he wouldn't have put it past her. But when he looked at her, he saw apprehension and worry in her face, fear that he would refuse; fear that she had no way of knowing was unneeded.

He would teach her to lose that fear. When it came to her happiness he would do just about anything, and he would be damned if he wasn't going to make sure she understood that. Thus, he asked her, "What time is your shift over?"

Green eyes brightened, a pleasant surprise lighting her face as she smiled back at him and the tension visibly fell from her shoulders. "Four," she took a glance at the clock, "in an hour."

"Very well, I will return for you then." He turned, the glossy material of his jacket catching the soft fluorescent lights of the office as he did so, the intent to depart clear in posture and expression.

Then something occurred to her. He was one of the top six of the highest-ranking angels in existence. With such a rank must come a great deal of responsibility; meetings, paperwork, whatever he had to do for the dead, and who knew how much else. What if he was taking time away from his duties to do this for her?

"Wait," she called, reaching out and grabbing his arm before he could disappear without giving her a chance to ask. Her fingers slid against his sleeve, the fabric slippery and forcing her to grip more tightly, fingers wrapping hastily around the column of his forearm. As much of it as she could, anyway.

His eyes flashed bright with surprise at first, looking at her behind a veil of white-gold hair. For one brief moment, he didn't look like the gentleman he normally seemed to be. His eyes were wild, pale amethysts imbedded in a base of pearl and white marble; something savage and feral, young, yet ancient, wise and impulsive; like a fierce golden bird, a sleek white wolf, and a man all wrapped up in a single body.

In that single instant she almost thought she caught a glimpse of a hard, predatory gleam in the pools of those eyes as they shifted with warmth; some kind of partially-buried instinct that had lain dormant for a long stretch of time. Something in the slightly desperate way she had grasped and held him had woken this creature, causing it to lifting its head to stare at her with fiery eyes and a hitching caress of breath.

He didn't look so tame anymore. In the place of the cool-headed and protective figure there was a strong, hot-tempered force composed purely of passion and aggression.

Yet the shiver that trailed down her spine was not in the least bit fearful. Quite the contrary, she felt intrigued. Anticipation and a sharp, lightning-quick stab of warmth coiled into a thick knot in the back of her throat as she looked back into the face that was so inhumanly beautiful that she almost couldn't breathe.

Suddenly, with a light jerk of his head as though clearing his sight of some kind of hindrance, his eyes cleared. Expression gentling, he regarded her with a kindness and affectionate questioning that made her very bones weak.

"Y-you aren't having to cut back on your work because of me—are you?" She hated herself for the way she stammered. But he didn't seem to notice; he just smiled at her, that slow, sweet curve of the lips that made the floor drop and the stomach compress like it was being squished into a tiny box.

"No," he said, "I'm lucky; my duties are flexible ones." In another moment his brow creased, his eyes darkening just a shade as he took note of the uncertainty on her face. "You worry that you're aggravating my position?"

She almost smiled. _Aggravating_. No one said _aggravating _in everyday conversation anymore. There was yet another tender reminder of his Old World charm, not that it was likely she would ever forget it.

"I don't know…I just don't want to be in the way," she explained, "it would be pretty ungrateful of me to disturb the schedules of Heaven just for a whim."

Azrael's laughter succeeded in smoothing out the tension in her belly. "Your concern is appreciated, Sweetling, but unnecessary. Let me assure you, I will be in no press for time." His expression turned bitter, touched by a bit of something that might have been sorrow or regret. Soon enough, though, the shadow faded and he gave her a small smile.

She returned the gesture, enjoying the warmth of the look that passed between them, finding that the contact turned her heart in a way that she didn't think she had ever felt before.

He stepped back, inclining his head to her in a respectful farewell. "I will return for you at four." And just like that, he had gone without even a spark of light or a flash of color to indicate that any sorcery had been used in the process, left in a state of surprise, amusement, and rather curious excitement.

She was interested to note that she actually anticipated the date instead of dreading it as she had thought she might. Her head felt light and bubbly, giddy, even; like some silly schoolgirl with plans for the Homecoming dance. The sensation was delicious. And for once she didn't even feel an urge to defend her excitement by claiming it was something else.

Humming quietly to herself, she went about her work with a renewed energy, hoping the time would fly and bring her shift to a close that much more quickly.

...

"What about this one?" Bright eyes curious and overflowing with the joy of discovery, Lilith pointed to the next painting displayed on the museum's sterile white wall, her head turning to peer up at her companion as he followed her over.

They had been carrying on this way for the past half-hour, she gesturing to a piece and he explaining what history he knew about it. It had turned out to be a pleasant way to bond over the paintings. With his seemingly endless supply of facts, stories, and memories, he fed her thirst for knowledge and the intrigue of such famous images. He seemed amused by her enthusiasm and her questions, which encouraged her greatly.

She had turned to Leonardo Da Vinci's masterpiece entitled _The Last Supper, _and he studied it quietly for a moment before answering. "This was a showcase of personal belief regarding the story of Christ, using a popular scene in the biblical story as an outlet. I believe the idea that Mary Magdalene was in fact the wife of Joshua—called Jesus—is familiar to you?"

A mute nod was her response. She had read the novel he spoke of, as many had, due to the controversy it had sparked from the church. The way he smiled thrilled her with the gift of knowing that the idea implied had not been far from truth.

Moving on, she indicated the next piece. He leaned slightly nearer to the large piece of canvas stretched between the corners of its frame, violet eyes dark with thought as he examined the depiction of the subtly smiling woman draped in black and seated before a somber background.

There was a little blue card tacked to the wall beside the painting, presenting printed text which told about the image's history and about the artist. She knew what it would say, everyone knew the _Mona Lisa,_ after all. But she wanted _his_ story, not theirs; they could only tell her what faulty human history might have pointed to. He knew the truth of what had actually been.

"A woman with a secret," he mused quietly, keeping his voice low so as not to allow any of the other visitors to hear him. "This is the portrait of a woman who Da Vinci suspected was a descendent of that same Mary Magdalene's."

Her eyebrows lifted, casting the painting a fascinated glance. "Was he right?"

"Well," he mused, "she couldn't tell him, but she wore that smile for a reason."

She offered her own soft smile, turning to the next display. It was a pair of paintings hung side by side, and might have been mistaken for two of the same exact image had she had not taken another moment to examine them further. There were four figures; two adults, one of these depicted with an angel's wings, and two toddlers accompanying them. And upon further study, she noticed several subtle differences between the two paintings.

"_Madonna of the Rocks?_"

"That would be this one," Azrael pointed to the image on the left, "and the version you''ll be most familiar with." She looked up and noticed that his expression was strangely twisted with faint traces of chagrin while he studied the paintings. "Again, you know that the church commissioned that particular copy, found it to their disliking, and ordered a new version to fit more closely with their demands. But there is an irony in the truths buried in the original."

He indicated the copy on the left, and the two hands posed above the head of the painted depiction of what was described to be the disciple John. "These hands are a extremely accurate depiction of history. How Da Vinci knew enough to paint it thus, I don't know, but the symbolism stand for both pity and doom."

Lilith's eyes took in the way the Virgin Mary's hand was crooked as though holding the head of a child directly over the infant John, and the way the depiction of the angel had his hand held with a single finger slicing just over the baby's head, as though pointing. Or cutting a throat. It was ominous to be sure, but it didn't make her feel that the so-called _scandal_ of it was deserved.

"John—whom you might have heard called _The Baptist—_was not only Joshua's peer, not his elder, but a sinner."

Her eyes widened. Not that her mental store of biblical myth was all that expansive, but every story she'd heard had mentioned John the Baptist in a positive light, and as a forerunner to Jesus. Apparently this was pure, unsliced baloney.

Azrael laughed, softly and shortly under his breath. "Oh, yes. He was an unpleasant creature, jealous and ambitious in the nastiest of ways. The number of people that came to me because of his actions was staggering." He pointed to the painted angel's hand, "the symbolism was used here to speak the truth about his sentence; an eternity in damnation for envy, greed, and indifference for life."

A grim sorrow seemed to overtake him then, putting a shallow chill to features that tightened, overwhelmed by its grip. "Not everything is black and white," he murmured. "Truth remains buried and unknown because people choose not to listen. They don't want to hear that the Baptist sinned. They don't want to hear that the Virgin Mary was not a virgin. They don't want to hear that it was _Adam_ who betrayed Eden's gifts."

Tentatively, without any true understanding of why she did, Lilith reached out to touch his cheek. Her fingers were a delicate rose-peach against the ivory of his skin, the surface smooth, soft and oddly cold to her touch.

It was a mere brush of fingertips trailing gently against the slope of a single sharp cheekbone and down the edge of his jaw, but when he looked at her, she could see the sadness and frustration begin to ebb. Almost immediately, he seemed to calm, the ruffled annoyance smoothing away. Her hand dropped, falling heavily back to her side as she felt her cheeks grow warm, and she averted her attention back to the paintings.

Azrael's gaze lingered on her, studying her for a long, thoughtful moment which she felt burning into the side of her face. Finally he turned his head and indicated the long, ornamental cross held in the crook of a praying baby Jesus' chubby arm. "See that?" She nodded. "Did you know that symbol is unholy?"

Her lips parted, taking a quick breath. Yet she had no time to speak her surprise before he explained; "During the old days, it was used for torture, murder and punishment. Innocent blood was spilt by unclean hands over this sign and justified by the will of a false god—all of it lies."

Immediately her face showed how disturbed she was by the revelation that had hit her like a ton of bricks. "Then all this time, Christians have prayed to something that stands for hatred and destruction?" She shuddered, the tortured screams of those nailed and bound to the cross and left to rot under the blistering sun pounding in her ears, ruminating on the horrible things had been done in the name of God.

A God they betrayed through such actions.

She wondered why she hadn't seen it before; such unspeakable crimes committed over a symbol smeared with blood of so-called believers. How could humanity still have any favor in the Creator's eyes?

"Try not to dwell on it." His hand settled on her shoulder, squeezing gently to send comfort and solace spreading through her. The melody of his voice offered her shelter and drove the evil images from her mind.

"It's a black mark on the history of the divine, but that symbol was never a holy one. This," his empty hand lowered to fuss with the sleeves of jacket and shirt, pulling apart the buttons to bare his wrist, "is the true Holy Cross."

She glanced down at the flesh he offered to her; the pale underside of his right wrist, white and delicate and lined with the traceries of veins that carried the bluest blood of any in the museum's premises. Over the white and iridescent blue was a series of solid black lines tattooed into the skin. A cross with four arms of an exactly equal length. One she had seen before.

For a moment she couldn't really believe what she was seeing, couldn't really believe that this image could possibly be what he said it was. It was a military symbol, adopted by bikers and punks for decoration and status. How could it be possible? "The Iron Cross?" Her tone was sharp with disbelief. "_This_ is the holy symbol?"

His laughter was a soft peal of sound. "Yes. The equal length symbolizes balance and order, equality and fair judgment. This can also be interpreted as the spokes of a wheel—all equal, representing the eternal circle of life. It can also be seen as symbolism for the elements or the four cardinal directions. I am not certain which is the intended meaning, or if it is all of them."

She retained the faint green tinge of someone sickened, her face drawn and tense with a mixture of disbelief and disgust. Her eyes darted discreetly around the room, clearly wondering how many of the people milling about them, studying the religious paintings, were the kind of _believers_ that prayed to a deity of pain.

She was angry. But alongside that anger he could feel a timid spark of uncertainty, questioning why she felt so strongly about a subject she had never before considered.

Perhaps _she_ didn't understand why the thought of the wrongs done in history were so clearly sickening to her, but he did. His vehemence had soaked the space between them like oil into cloth, setting it ablaze with the imagery of blood and his long-suppressed rage, and somehow it had spilled into her. It had altered her emotional response to such awful things, and it had rattled her.

"Do you wish to go?" he asked; his touch tender to her forehead and temple as he examined her unusually pale face. A cool layer of perspiration had risen to her skin and he reached to combat it with a whisper of comfort and serenity.

"No," she murmured, her voice faint, as though she spoke from far away. Then as he slipped a little more fortification into her, she gathered her strength and began to calm. "No," she repeated, more firmly this time. "I'm fine. But I think I'll steer clear of churches from now on."

Gaining more color as she went, she turned the corner that led from the Da Vinci hall of the exhibit into the broader, wider, and more brightly-lit room that housed a multitude of styles and artists displayed for similarities to the qualities of the Renaissance themes of religion and myth.

He followed at a slightly slower pace, keeping a close eye on his ward as she wandered through the exhibit, studying the art. None of the pieces were new to him. He preferred to watch her; filling his eyes with the way she walked, delicately – as befitting a ballerina – with her head tilting every now and then to adjust her angle on the odd picture. She was lovely, but not because of her face. It was the integrity and observance with which she moved and the careful wonder in her eyes that caused him to soften.

When she came to an abrupt halt in front of a wall empty but for a single painting, regarding it with a focus much deeper than she had shown the rest,he stepped up behind her. He had expected her to notice this one, if not simply due to the title, then for the elements in the picture itself.

She lifted her eyes once more to the bronze plaque reading; _Angel of Death by Evelyn de Morgan, 1890. _

"This isn't you."

Azrael smiled. "How do you know?"

Seeming oddly saddened, Lilith answered quietly, "well, the face is wrong, _your_ wings are white…and I've never seen you wear brown. But it's more—" she hesitated, "it's more than that."

He stretched out a hand, trailing the tip of one finger softly downward along the line of the scythe held in the painted angel's right. "I never carry this when I'm working. _Never._"

"You have one at all?" She asked, her eyes shifting to look at him, "I would have thought that's just a myth."

"I do. But it is a tool of war, not meant for visitations." The finger cooled by the protective glass sealing the painting from elements and touch fell away. "The idea of reaping souls has always fascinated humans, but it isn't realistic. I have no need of a tool besides my will to separate soul from body, so what use is there in carrying around a weapon that would only cause them alarm?"

He sighed, letting out a heavy breath dark with emotion that shimmered like ice where it brushed her cheek. "I have mixed feelings about this image. On one hand, it portrays gentility and peace, serenity, rest, which is what I offer all the deceased." His expression darkened, his eyes hard with displeasure. A low, furious noise shuddered up from his throat and curled at firm white lips.

"But I am _not_ a patron of fear," he growled, "I don't_ feed_ off of pain or suffering. I don't gain pleasure from their passing. This image gives me a light of condescending cruelty, of carelessness, when _I _am injured more by their deaths than they could _ever_ be…"

His words broke into silence, seething with temper driven by the thought that the people he helped resented him because he supposedly stole something from them. She knew what he said was true. The humans would age and forget, let the hurts heal and pass into history, but he could never heal. Not all the way.

For the second time that afternoon, Lilith felt the urge to touch him, to soothe the flood of feeling that coursed through her warden like a raging, temperamental river. She did so, but only because she felt that in some, curious way, he needed her. She laid her hand on his forearm, pressing against muscles coiled tight beneath the sleek fabric of his jacket, gripping gently with a steady hand. "So, it is you...and it isn't you at the same time?"

"I suppose it is," he mused quietly, "in a way."

For the second time, he calmed beneath her touch. The hardened edges to his handsome face softened while he stretched his fingers to loosen them; yet he continued to stare at the painting, some sliver of steel still buried beneath an otherwise blank exterior.

She tugged at his sleeve, coaxing his attention away from the picture and onto her in a deliberate attempt to distract him from an obviously negative surge of memory. "Let's go outside, it's stuffy in here."

He followed her without comment, his steps sure and steady despite the lingering sense of dread that still clung to him like cobwebs. But by the time she had led him down the wide steps guarded by alabaster rams and out through the museum's main door he seemed to be completely relaxed. She trotted down the sidewalk beneath the Hammering Man statue, watching the white cloud of her breath as she exhaled, the cold frost of moisture forming tiny specks of ice that floated away of the evening breeze.

"Much better," she chirped, doing her best to supply some cheer. She looked over her shoulder at him, watching the smile that slid across his firm lips, watching as he leaned back to brace his shoulders and the sole of one shoe against the museum's light colored wall.

"Yes," he agreed, tipping his head back and looking up at the clouded, cobalt sky.

Looking at him, she noticed immediately that his shoulders were hunched as though to keep off the cold. It shouldn't have mattered to him, considering how resilient his source of internal heat was, and she wondered whether something about the painting she had pulled him from had done more to unnerve him than she'd initially thought.

He either could see or feel her glance, and without prompting answered airily; "I am fine. Merely keeping up appearances."

"Keeping…?" Understanding came more quickly when he gave a very visible shiver under the touch of a particularly heavy brush of wind. He was trying to look human.

"Revealing the true existence of angels and demons might cause a bit of a panic, if you know what I mean," he shot her a crooked smile. "And sometimes we can be a little…ostentatious."

Lilith's snicker was muffled by her scarf as she re-wound it about her throat, but being in the path of the cold affected her more than it did him and she retreated to the wall to get shelter from the wind.

Ever attentive, he slid an arm around her shoulders and tucked her to his side. At first she stiffened, reacting automatically to proximity before she consciously forced the tension in her back to ease. He was warm and unthreatening, and she found she rather liked being cushioned beneath his shoulder. A small spark of warmth in his eyes said that he'd noticed her effort to relax, and though he masked it, she had seen the soft edge of gratitude that had softened the firm angles of his face.

"Sometimes I change my hair," he added, "and occasionally I will use alternate styles of clothing, but nothing too dramatic. Generally humans aren't perceptive enough to notice divinity unless they're forcibly or accidentally exposed."

Her smile faltered, then fell. Accidentally exposed? Had this entire aspect of her life never been meant to exist? Why did that idea scare her so deeply to the bone?

Picking up on the change in her mood, Azrael's grip about her shifted and he towed her gently away from the wall and into a steady stroll down First Avenue. "I think you should know I had originally intended to reveal myself in a much gentler way than I did. It was an accident that you saw me the day you almost took on that car."

She eyed him with some puzzlement. "Why wasn't I supposed to see you? Couldn't everyone else?"

"Not at that time," his smile was crooked, "but touching you allowed you to see me. I was trying to be inconspicuous; since I'm not exactly what many would call normal in looks even without showing my wings."

"There are plenty of interesting-looking people out there," she informed him, "I doubt you stand out as much now as you might have in the Renaissance. Why can't you walk around freely?"

His eyes were pale with the surprise that she was making such a fuss over his freedom. The breeze toyed with his white-blond hair like the caress of a lover to his pristine face, and she found herself wanting to reach up and brush the strands back and away from his eyes as they paused at the crosswalk over Madison Street.

"I suppose," he paused before admitting sheepishly, "selfishness. I didn't want to be hindered by others so I would be free to look after you. And…" He was silent for a lengthy moment, his breath frosting the air with white. "I wished to avoid being hurt, I think. It I could help it."

Lilith felt the guilt clutch at her stomach. Whatever pain he had felt, without reason or excuse, rested on her shoulders. "Have I hurt you?" she whispered, dreading the answer she might receive.

The angel's eyes flashed white with alarm. Shaking his beautiful head, he gifted her with a gentle squeeze to the waist with a powerful arm. "No. But I will say that I'm glad you didn't panic. Had you been vocal about what I was, I would have had to silence you." A grimace warped his features. "And obliterating and replacing memory is not a pleasant business."

Gulping back a squeak, she gasped, "you can replace _memories?_"

"I can, but it's hardly a walk in the park. I'm grateful we avoided that—I could never forgive doing such a despicable thing to you." A note of affection reached his voice. "You are a fortunate young lady. To be trusted with this knowledge is both a rare and extraordinary gift."

She smiled bashfully and ducked her head, filling her eyes with the sidewalk beneath their feet.

Something between them had changed, and she didn't need the warm, solid weight of his arm draped casually about her middle to tell her so. There was no more fear, as though the space she used to carry it was empty, her supply of it used up; and she realized that it was much nicer being in his company when her silly fears were tucked away. She felt closer to him than she had to anyone, and he wasn't even _human._

But did that really matter anymore?

With a tiny shake of her head, she nestled closer to his warmth. No, she didn't care that he wasn't human. Why should it matter? _Kevin_ wouldn't have been caught dead simply spending time with her with no motive or drive for getting something out of it.

In fact, she got the distinct impression that Azrael was just as happy and content as she was merely because he could be with her without having to hide himself, and that was rather sweet. She smiled, her heart fluttering in her chest when she noticed the curve of his lips match hers perfectly.

But the peaceful reverie was short-lived.

A moment later Azrael stopped dead in his tracks, shattering the quiet and restful moment when he gripped her firmly and pressed her to his chest. His aura had leapt from calm to alert and protective in a split second, his senses widened and sharpened beyond what she could understand. She blinked up at him, alarm flickering in her eyes as she watched him scan the quiet streets around them like a hawk searching for movement, his nostrils flared to catch a scent that didn't seem to be there.

But the predatory edge to his carved features didn't frighten her. What frightened her was whatever had startled him. Though it might have unnerved her any other time, she knew the clutching, possessive way he held her was devoted solely to his desire to keep her safe. And she pitied anything stupid enough to risk his wrath by threatening her.

She surveyed the stretch of cement around them, the passing people who seemed to take no notice of them as they meandered by, eyes wide in the hopes of catching sight of whatever he saw…and failing rather miserably.

When almost a whole minute had passed and Azrael still hadn't so much as taken another breath, she questioned, "what is it?"

"Shh," he bid her to be silent, his eyes snapping with pale sparks of fire as he stared at a building across the way though attempting to see straight through it. "I am trying to hear—"

"…_and when that is done you will bring the girl to me." _

"_B-but I—"_

"_Shut it, you thick-skulled sack of meat, do as I say or your guts will paint the ground. Bring her to _me._"_

His eyes narrowed, his jaw clenched. Shutting the not-so-far-off conversation out of his head, he took his charge by the elbow tugged her gently back the way they had come, continuing to eye his surroundings with the predatory prowess of a raptor. "This way," he told her, voice constricted as though from between clenched teeth.

Lilith obeyed without question. If he sensed danger, it was wise to listen. He drew her from right arm to left arm and back as he led her down First and onto Second Avenue, constantly changing her position as if to keep her from becoming a target. She didn't try to pretend she wasn't even a little bit frightened by the intensity quivering beneath his skin as he led her into a winding series of back-alleys that joined with the slums of the city.

They seemed to walk for hours, until her feet began to ache and her knees felt as though they might simply cease to work. Then they rounded a corner which opened into a narrow street and he headed toward to a brick monstrosity of a building, run-down and old, headed by an electric sign that flashed with an eerie red color.

_Macabre Hall, _it read; and while she couldn't have guessed why her guardian seemed calmer at the sight of it, she approached without comment, curious despite her uncertainty.


	15. The Hall of Sin

**Chapter 17  
**The Hall of Sin

Recommended Listening: "Heaven's a Lie" by Lacuna Coil

* * *

Situated deep in the heart of the alley-twisted slums of Seattle, the half-hidden nightclub featured the outer appearance of a run-down warehouse mixed with an old speakeasy. Once a hole-up for gangs of the 1920's, it still retained some of the classic, heart-wrenching badassery that was associated with human devilishness around its aged architecture. It served as a refuge for the darkest and most decadent indulgences.

Haloed by the grunge of an old city's secrets and cradled in whispers, the Macabre Hall was both dancehall and bar, restaurant and relaxation spot. It had stood for decades, refurbished in the neo-gothic taste befitting its heritage, and served its immortal patrons with whatever sort of pleasures they could imagine.

Occasionally a brave human would happen along, slipping unknowingly through the spells which masked it in silence, to spend some time among those that peered out from the shadows with eyes that burned and teeth that flashed white and hungry. Sometimes the passing mortal would even make it back out alive.

The lord of this hall, this haven for criminals and revelers alike, was the prince of sin himself; Beelzebub, the firstborn son of the devil. It was due to this little detail that a single corner of the city became to be more deadly for the unknowing, everyday mortal than the entire span of the United States ever could have been.

Because the prince was as much a patron as he was a manager, it was rare that the white-haired demon could be found haunting his paper-strewn office. While at home he ran a strictly governed realm. But in this – _his_ sanctuary – there was always some sort of upheaval to be found. Whether it was a bar-fight, an illegal drug deal, or a live music act, activity ran rampant amidst the loud talk and the hard beat of music causing the floors to shudder and creak.

It was a rough place, promising safety to nothing and no one; yet it had a morbidly settled kind of comfort for someone who needed merely to drown in sound and booze. But the mayhem here did have rules, and those who violated these rules would pay with their skin. _Literally._

At first, all Lilith could see was blackness. She groped for the stair railing she assumed was coming and her hand met Azrael's warm, calloused fingers. He took hold of her palm, offering a steady, patient support while she located the first of the steps, apparently not handicapped by the dark as she was. Like a cat, he seemed able to pick out traces of light imperceptible to human eyes so he could see in the deepest of solitary nights.

While it was slightly unnerving to think that her companion had traits similar to an animal, she was able to shrug it off quite lightly. Quite honestly, she wasn't so much disturbed as she was awed by it.

There was something almost intimate about the darkness and the close proximity he kept to her. His palm was a gentle strength cradling her hand, guiding her slowly along without any sense or flavor of haste. She didn't feel hurried, even though she knew he was in one. The only negative emotion she sensed was one of mild concern under which was buried a sharp watchfulness with which he treated her steps.

As they descended the black gradually became easier to penetrate, a soft amber light trickling into, flaring into brilliance as the stairs ended in a small landing which led to an equally narrow entry hall. Strung across the front of that hall and barring the way forward was a thick silver chain.

Azrael's fingers curled around her elbow just as a massive man stepped from a concealed corner to stand behind the chain. For such an intimidating specimen he moved with an eerie quiet, but his eyes were dark and glittered in a manner that distinctly reminded her of those big shiny beetles from the Amazon, and eliminated whatever amazement she'd harbored for his grace.

Without uttering a single word, the door guard lifted a hand, palm up, upon which sat a deck of what appeared to be playing cards. From this he drew a single card and held it up to show them the back; a scarlet base decorated with an Egyptian eye decal in black and gold.

Confused and unsure whether something was supposed to be happening, she eyed the card curiously, wondering if it was a spell or a password of some kind.

"The Magician," Azrael murmured, his voice sure and deceptively calm considering how tense his hand was at her arm.

Whatever they might have meant, the words caused the man to offer a single nod and reach to unhook one end of the chain before stepping aside, allowing them to pass. He didn't question Lilith's presence, and so she assumed it was because of her guardian's identity or social standing that she was allowed inside without having to go through the same ordeal herself.

"It's an entry test," the angel explained as he led through the hallway and into a dimly-lit room. A small room accented by the wide, open window to the kitchen and a floor dotted by tables and chairs scattered with patrons who sought quiet rather than the noise from the next room. "Though it doesn't serve much of a purpose but to annoy those that want entry. The guarding spells dissuade most unwanted visitors."

"All these people are immortals?" Tone hesitant, she reached to slip her arm through the gap made by the bend of his elbow, pressing close to him.

He obliged her, allowing her the sense of security she found in clinging to his elbow. "For tonight. Occasionally a mortal will stumble across us and guess their way in. The demons don't mind. It gives them something to play with. Ah—if you'll excuse the expression." He nudged her slightly forward to walk in front of him, putting her at a more favorable position to guard. "Keep your eyes open, this place can be a bit rough—"

Almost as the caution left his mouth the spine-chilling sound of breaking glass splintered the air. As one, their heads whipped toward the origin of the noise to see a pair of male demons spill to the floor in a mess of tearing claws and snarling as onlookers gathered around.

Whether the objective of these observers was to pull them apart or goad the combatants on, Lilith never found out. Azrael snorted his disdain and towed her gently off to the cloth-lined buffer-hall leading to the next room. The sounds of shrieks and cheering were driven from her ears by the throbbing, electrified bass of a beat which caused the world to tremble.

Blindingly dark, the body-packed space flared with the flickering spray of colored lights from above and from the stage far to the right. Her body ached, unaccustomed to the noise, reeling in the smothering mix of alcohol, smoke, and perfumed sweat as she lingered in the doorway that could lead her out of the seemingly endless swarm of sound-drunk people.

Azrael calmly nudged her inside, veering left toward the trail of steady lights that lined the far wall opposite the stage. It seemed no different than a regular nightclub – not that she'd been to many. Bodies writhed and twisted, serpentine, close and stifling about them as they moved in a collective mass to the beat. The air was pressing, stuffy and thick. It dragged at her lungs and in tandem with the undercurrent rhythm that seemed to leak into her chest and clutch at her heartbeat, she fought to breathe regularly.

Yet as she glanced around, she caught glimpses of things – startling, unnerving things – that pulled small, uneasy shivers from a part of her mind that acknowledged that this was very far from a normal human nighttime haunt.

It was creepy, not to mention much too loud and raucous for sensible comfort. She would have liked to leave, if for the sole purpose of relocating her sense of proportions. In fact, she might have done just that if not for her guardian's steady, guiding forward momentum.

And then a voice rose, lilting from the hard, metallic tones of percussion and base, oddly familiar in its silvery tone and slippery dynamic, startling her brain into recognition.

"Set me free, your heaven's a lie…"

She turned to look at the singer, her eyes widening when they focused on the familiar flash of gelled silver hair. He looked less like any kind of royalty in a pair of severely mutilated jeans that had once been blue in color and a black t-shirt spray-painted with a white pentagram. While she knew the star was commonly referenced as insignia of the devil, she didn't know whether its appearance splayed upon the chest of a demon prince was meant to be some manner of pun.

A soft nudge drew Azrael's attention from some far off potential threat and she pointed to the stage where Beelzebub was busy giving the microphone more lip service than it probably knew how to handle.

"Well, then," the angel sighed, "we wait."

A moment later, with a flash of bright eyes, he had reached out to snag a passing boy by the arm. A boy who, with soft cheeks and tousled hair, looked barely old enough to be called a teenager let alone old enough for a place like that; which was certainly why Azrael had grabbed him so swiftly.

But to her surprise, Azrael's words were shaped with the familiarity suited to someone he knew well. "Ranael, hello. Would you please inform His Highness that he has visitors? We'll wait in his office." And with a single nod, dark hair flopping about his cheeks as he did so, the boy turned to dive back into the crowd and make his way toward the stage to relay the message. Azrael followed the boy's progress with sharp eyes until he became swallowed by the swarm.

"Nice thing about soldiers," the angel mused, "they're efficient."

That little boy: a soldier? He couldn't have been older than thirteen. "You're joking—" Lilith's tone was incredulous.

Taking her hand and folding it gently about his forearm, he guided her toward the opening archway in the sheetrock at the far left of the stage. The single lamp lit at one corner illuminated a shallow trio of descending cement steps. "Changelings have the ability to take on many different combinations of attributes to modify their appearance," he informed her. "Ranael is one of Hell's most skilled and refined soldiers, and doesn't always look so shapeless. She's actually quite strong."

Lilith trailed along behind him, but she was distracted by curiosity initiated by the subject of _changelings_. "You mean he—he can change into anything he wants? _Whenever_ he wants?"

She stepped carefully down the stairs toward the direction of heavy wooden door that was old but far from rotting, riddled with grooves and scratches that marred its otherwise appealing, golden hue. The dirty metal plate attached to the lintel was engraved with the word: _Manager._

"Yes, anything except for the eyes," he relaxed his gentle grip upon her arm. "A changeling cannot change their eyes, interestingly enough."

When the echoes of his words ebbed into silence, he pushed the time-scarred door open and urged her to enter the office.

Deeply disheveled, it housed a desk and cabinets that were strewn with tipping stacks of paperwork, glasses stuffed almost to bursting with pens, pencils, sticks of charcoal, and even what looked suspiciously like an old fashioned stick of colored wax used for sealing envelopes. It wasn't dirty, per say, just untidy, with a distinct unlived-in mustiness to it.

The only personalized feature was a single wall plastered ceiling to floor with pictures; a solid wall of memory. Photographs, magazine covers, newspaper clippings, drawings, pages torn out of books, among other things, had been stapled and taped to cover the plain, cold surface. Some of the photos and articles were very old, grayed or yellowed with age, but some were as fresh and shiny as though they had been added that present year.

As she approached, one image in particular caught her eye; a black and white Victorian-styled photograph of a stern-looking man with neatly tied-back hair, crisp suit, and what appeared to be a blindfold of black cloth veiling his eyes. It was both serene and sinister with its aged, stiff sort of beauty.

When Azrael came up behind her to peer over her shoulder at one of the more modern images, she followed his gaze to the cover of a magazine she didn't recognize, depicting three young women.

"Good Lord—" The angel muttered, eyeing the picture with a curious mixture of fond aggravation and strained nostalgia. "He kept _this_? Bless the little packrat."

Two of the women in the photo were posed as though leaning on the edges of the magazine's border. The third stood with her arms outstretched, reaching for the camera and what lay beyond it as though extending both permission and invite for an embrace. Dressed in deep tones of black and blue, the women regarded their audience with expressions of individualized personality. Over their heads was suspended a twisted, stylized logo: EVE.

Flashes of fishnet striped the arms and bare midriff of the girl on the far right. Her silver hair highlighted the mischief glittering in her amber eyes and the sly provocation in a low-cut shirt and short pleated skirt.

The girl at the center was dressed similarly, with black and white stripes in place of mesh and an off-shoulder top stitched in red over her tight-fit miniskirt. Her skin was eerily white and thick, elaborate lines of liquid black traced her eyelashes, aiding her bright green eyes in serenading the passing viewer.

Yet it was the girl on the left that caught and held Lilith's eyes.

Unlike the others, this woman wore a pair of ragged jeans and a halter-neck vest which buttoned down the front, arms looped with chains and thin metal bracelets. Her hair was a pale, familiar shade of platinum gold, but that wasn't what had cued Lilith's suspicion. It was the arrangement of sharp cheekbones, graceful brow and straight nose that sparked the double-take, and the quiet violet shade of the woman's eyes that made her think she had seen something impossible.

She peered up at her warden, carefully eyeing the carved lines and shadows that formed his face. Their perfect imprint had been burned in ink onto the glossy paper, softened only slightly around the edges of jaw and chin. Her eyes lingered at perfect curve of a mouth which had been exactly copied onto the magazine's cover.

Glancing back at the photograph, she took another long look. There was no mistake; the woman in the picture was slender and curved, with pronounced (if slight) hips and breasts. It was definitely a woman. But how could that be?

The Roman numeral for thirteen was emblazoned across the chest of the t-shirt the golden-haired woman wore. In Tarot cards, the number thirteen was associated with the depiction of death, a fact that she had unwittingly stored and found herself shocked to be utilizing. She didn't expect the symbolism to be exact, but it seemed like the sort of ironic detail that he might use.

"Is this you?"

He gave her a crooked smile. "It was. A fear years ago."

"But," she fought a touch of unease. "You're not a Changeling—?"

"We all have the ability to take two forms: one male, one female," he interrupted patiently when she struggled with a way to make her question less rudely-formed. "However, we keep the same overall build, features, and coloring no matter which we choose. We can dye our hair, add artificial tan or pallor, but we cannot change our features like the changelings can. This is my male," he indicated his real, flesh-and-blood self, "and that is my female," he indicated the picture.

"I prefer to be male. I feel more comfortable this way. But there are just as many who prefer female form. And some—" he cast a wry glance toward the closed door just as the clatter of heavy footsteps lit upon the stairs. His voice rose in volume, no longer speaking solely for the sake of her ears. "Some are deviants regardless which form they take."

The door slammed open, allowing a dazzling silver flash to dodge into the room and glare with tawny eyes struck bright with adrenaline. With a heavy smack the door ricocheted off the adjacent wall and shut with a thud. "I heard that, jackass," the prince accused, his voice snapping like a static shock through the air.

Though he wasn't beautiful like the angel was, the demon prince held his own sort of loveliness, but his attraction lay within a coy, devilish mischief that dusted the angles of his face. His eyes were quick and clever, his tongue sharp, and while he wasn't typically handsome, he was definitely striking. Yet he made Lilith more nervous than breathless.

"It's true, though," the angel defended coolly, the very corner of his lips twitching with the faintest hint of a smile. "Now be quiet and listen, I have a favor to ask."

Though this appeared to be a somewhat hostile exchange of words to have passed between two men called one another _friends_, neither of them seemed to think so. Their postures were casual, their expressions sharing a mixture of amusement and mild, skin-deep annoyance that might belong to those who enjoyed a good bicker. It was actually sort of relaxing.

Beelzebub strode to the rear of his paper-strewn desk and flopped into the leather wing-backed chair that awaited him there and promptly propped his feet upon its surface. Papers crunched beneath his heavy boots. For a long, piercing, and frankly uncomfortable moment his golden hawk's eyes lit upon Lilith, studying her, regarding her with an intensity that had her fidgeting with the hem of her sweater. It was as if he were measuring her, weighing something in his mind regarding her presence there. It wasn't disapproval, but it wasn't outright fondness either.

Then, breaking the daunting stare, he beckoned her forward, motioning to the chair that sat on the opposite side of the desk. "Please, have a sit," he told her smoothly before shooting a dirty, narrow-eyed glare at Azrael. "_You_ can stand."

The angel smiled gently, telling Lilith it was ok to accept the invitation by way of a simple nod. She sank gingerly into the stiff upholstery noting that the way he followed to take up a position behind her seemed very much like that of a bodyguard. This was probably more for her security than his own because she doubted he felt threatened by this company in particular. "Thank you, Princeling."

Beelzebub scowled at him. "_Any_ways…" The demon prince stretched his arms over his head, t-shirt stretching over a lean, muscular torso as he clawed at the air with his long fingers. "What can I do for you?"

The playful haze still clinging to the mood of the room shifted to one of guarded haste. While she couldn't see his face from her seat, Lilith could feel Azrael's posture stiffen behind her, the weight of his presence clouding over with an odd, new emotion.

He hesitated before answering the question, his voice low and brisk. "I have been feeling some strange vibes—"

"You really _are_ an old man," Beelzebub scoffed; looking viciously amused. "Getting the heebie-jeebies…" He snickered at his own joke.

Azrael's sigh was more of a vibration she felt against the back of her neck than an actual sound; warm, but heavy. "I need a babysitter." He rested a light hand upon her shoulder, his fingers curling along the curve of her bones and the flesh that bound them, and even the gentle grip served as a vivid reminder that – had he chosen to – he could have crushed her delicate shoulder into pulp. Interesting how the weight of power was all the more impressive when it was held in check.

But wait a minute. Had he said _babysitter?_

"I beg your pardon?" she gasped, twisting in her seat and giving him a glare that could have withered the brightest and hardiest of flowers. "I do _not_ need a babysitter!"

"Sweetling," he began in a complacent tone, "you have an uncanny attraction to anything remotely dangerous within an eight mile radius." While he explained patiently, she noticed when he shot an inconspicuous glance at the intricate hourglass clock upon the desktop. "There is something—I must do, and as it might be a risk to your safety, I would feel more at ease if you were watched over. For all his character flaws, I trust Beelzebub to keep an eye on you—"

"Two eyes, when I can," the demon interjected lazily, ignoring the slur he knew was purely affectionate.

Azrael took gentle hold of her shoulders, long fingers gripping her upper arms as he gazed down at her and murmured, imploring with every trace of charm he possessed, "Please, Lilith. For me?" And that was _quite_ a bit of compulsory power. She could almost feel it roll from his throat and down his tongue to soar through the air like a bird and land, fluttering, somewhere inside her ribcage.

She knew she couldn't fight him. Despite her instinctive apprehension in regards to the demon prince, Beelzebub hadn't yet acted truly untoward in any way, nor did he seem remotely threatening. Azrael trusted him; and while the angel may have been cryptic in his explanation for leaving her in the demon's care, he must have his reasons. There was no real reason aside from stubbornness or spite for her to refuse, and looking into the eyes of her guardian angel she knew she had strength for neither.

Averting her gaze in favor of staring at the scuffed cement floor, she agreed.

The smile he gave her was reward enough for any distress she may have felt; golden and beautiful. The heart fluttered beneath her breast as he bent to thank her with a soft, tender kiss to a cheek which flushed with warmth beneath his lips. "Thank you," he murmured to her, "I'll be back to take you home as soon as I'm able."

Then he turned to give his friend a teasing look pierced with the vaguest hint of warning. His tone was both playful and sharp as he added something else, a passing remark spoken in a language as flowing and colorful as warm honey. She understood none of the words, but from the way the sounds seemed to tingle with energy inside her ears, she knew it was not of earthly origin.

Beelzebub stuck an impulsive tongue out at him before the angel laughed gently and gracefully saw himself out. Lilith sat in a daze. It seemed that he would always have such an affect; dazzling her witless even after he had vacated the premises, leaving her breathless in the wake of his presence.

Yet the angel's departure left them in awkward company. Unsure what to do with herself, she found her eyes deliberately avoiding the room's other occupant. Plucking up some courage, she asked shyly, "what did he say?"

Beelzebub shrugged, unconcerned, and answered, "told me to keep my hands to myself." She balked; yet the flash of her eyes to his face was the only betrayal of her alarm; which didn't go unnoticed. "Not that he needs to," he added. "As long as you're in my care, you're safe."

He studied her quietly, his hawkish eyes sweeping across her for a second time. Again he gave her the feeling that she was being assessed, as though he were attempting to pull her thoughts out through her face. The expression he wore was strange, sharp, twisted with a kind of pitied comprehension that grew the longer he looked at her, until she wanted to squirm underneath the scrutiny.

Finally he spoke. "You don't know, do you?" he asked, and the words came surprisingly gently.

She stared at him; caught off guard by the strangely serious aspect to someone she had associated with noise and energy. "Know what?"

He nodded once, his suspicions confirmed. Twisting, he lowered his feet to the floor, his silver hair gleaming softly under the plain overhead light, and to her eyes he appeared oddly guarded. "Has Azrael told you why he's so attracted to you?"

"I—" Her voice broke, her cheeks flushing with heat. It had been such a personal question, her immediate reaction swung toward offense. But what reason had a demon to bother with personal boundaries when it came to conversation?

It only took another moment to realize he was right, drowning her objections in a thoughtful hush. When Azrael had gifted her with the truth of what he was and why he followed her, he had claimed to be the only angel who could love in a non-platonic manner without suffering persecution and banishment under the law. But he had never explained why he had come to _her._

"I thought not," Beelzebub mused, tone dry. "It's no surprise, so don't hold it against him. He _is_ Seraphim." With a roll of his eyes, he gave her a pointed look: _need __I __say __more, _it seemed to say."Still," his tawny eyes darkened meaningfully. "I think you should be told."

There was something in that look that nudged her suspicions toward the forefront of her mind, icy with the frost of dread. "What do you mean? What's wrong?"

"Tonight?" He snorted good-naturedly. "Probably nothing—Azrael has a tendency to overreact to the tiniest things. I doubt there's a problem at all. I'd wager he just got some protective nerve bent out of shape, but he's always been that way, especially with you. Which brings me back to the point."

He was toying with the cap of a pen fished from underneath the stacks of papers, rolling the little plastic piece around and around from palm to fingertips. The repetition was mesmerizing, unnaturally so, to the point where she half suspected him of trying to hypnotize her into sleep, she he wouldn't have to elaborate. Or perhaps she was merely paranoid.

"One of the major differences between mortals and immortals is the depth and range of their senses. A mortal's sense of sight, smell, and hearing—the defensive senses have been so severely whittled-down by lack of necessity that they can scarcely contribute to everyday life. Azrael's senses are significantly stronger than yours, and they can process the information gained by them much more efficiently than a mortal could."

Here he paused, a delicate, open-ended kind of pause. As he looked her in the eyes, pinning her beneath an age and memory she had no way to fathom, she discovered she was unable to anything but breathe.

"You were a constant temptation to him. A pretty, young girl, fragile and full of life, and breakable—as mortality is to us all. Most angels have a natural ability to withstand and ignore the appeal you hold for them, but Azrael was built differently." He sighed, a short, empathetic sound. "I think originally he meant to leave you on your own after a few years, but that didn't last. The very moment you entered womanhood he knew as much."

The demon's laughter was vibrant and loud, lilting in the air like the call of some prideful bird of prey. "I admit; I pitied him. I always have, since I was old enough to understand what he goes through every day—death, and the pain and grief that come with it isn't something just anyone can handle, not without the balance of sensitivity." A mischievous curl of pale lips and sharp white teeth, his smirk was pure and utter wickedness. "And you don't have a clue what you do to him."

Confusion outweighed any embarrassment she may have instinctively felt. Gathering the basic concept of mortality being appealing to an angel was easy enough, simply for the sake of free-will; it made sense that the freedom humans had would be something desired. That they were breakable, and therefore an enigma, she could understand as well. But she couldn't understand how that could mix with the mention of a sensory gap, and it painted a question in her eyes.

"Your _smell,_ darlin'," he murmured, as if what he said was a terrible secret. "It's different for all of us, but one thing that tells an immortal male volumes about the woman he wants is scent. By scent we can pick up everything from a woman's preferred taste in soaps and shampoos to some of the deeper facets of her personality."

He gave her a considerate nod: "to me you smell like flowers, shyness, and a like of quiet. Not my taste, but for Azrael I'd think it's pretty damn delicious. Everything from your hair, your skin, the smell of the blood in your veins, other body fluids," she blushed rather spectacularly, "combined with your looks and attitude, and you've got the ideal drug for an addict who's done his damnedest to abstain."

Skepticism served an ideal companion for her shock. This was ridiculous. There was no way that she could have such a power, and no way _any_one could find her that attractive. Of all the silly things to say. She wasn't an ideal anything; she was a meek, pathetic, paranoid librarian with the social skills of a field mouse and an anti-man complex.

It was all so absurd that the words leapt free before she could shut herself up. "How could you _possibly_ know that?" But despite some mild chagrin at her big mouth, she was amazed to see traces of sadness appear in the demon's golden eyes. Or maybe it was grief? She didn't even know him very well and it seemed bizarre.

Beelzebub's expression was grim with resignation, his tone low and heavy. "Because I've seen him do this before." He saw her eyes widen and seemed to take on another thread of amusement. "Did you think you were the first?"

"Well, no, but…"

Her words faded, entangled in quiet as she thought about that. She'd never imagined Azrael with anyone else before, but it wasn't all that difficult to do. He held the drive and focus of knowledge and knowledge only came with experience; but the sudden picture of her guardian pursuing someone else as he had been pursuing her – someone much worthier of his beauty and his grace – made her feel insignificant and worthless.

"There was only really one other, if it makes you feel better," Beelzebub's tone was soft and understanding, "and it was a very long time ago. But I saw how he obsessed over her, filing himself down to a sliver of what he was before she ran off with some mortal boy with a merchant's wealth. The greedy slut."

She felt her heart contract with pain for the sake of her guardian. Such a betrayal would have been horrible anyone, let alone an angel dependant on affection for protection against the chill of his purpose. "How heartless…" she choked, staring down at the hands limp upon her lap and the veins etching blue trails in her wrists, trying to comprehend the agony that rejection must have been for him.

"He's been limping along ever since. Empty where he needed to be fulfilled until the day he found you. And I'm warning you now," there was a clear, sharp note to the way he handled his words then, "where she was a crush, you are a devastation. There will be _no_ other; only you, compelling him to act on instincts most angels have never suffered—instincts he's tried to teach himself to forget. But like an addict, once he's known enough he'll never be able to get the taste of you out of his mouth."

She blushed, flustered by the implied relationship between her and her guardian's warm, expressive lips.

Beelzebub regarded her with a distinct hardness to his golden gaze. She could feel the slight edge of desperation he felt in trying to force his words through to her heart, willing her to understand the gravity behind them. "If you follow in her footsteps even just by leaving, it will break him. So I say this; if you are uncomfortable with him in a way you don't think you can overcome, youshouldend it."

Taken aback, Lilith spluttered, startled by the vehemence of the demand. "What? End it…but you just said that would _hurt_ him—"

"It'll hurt both of you far worse if you don't cut it off quickly. The less you give him before stabbing him through the heart, the better off you'll be."

Indignation and dislike flooded her veins, hurt by the assumption that she wanted to cause harm to the man who had shown her such devotion. Her green eyes narrowed, hardening like glass. She was not so ungrateful and cruel! "I am _not_ going to—"

"Think carefully before you finish that," he warned, caution in the voice he used to interrupt her. She wondered if it was possible that what she saw was pity in his eyes. "It may mean your happiness."

Her only reply was an empty, puzzled frown, torn between two options she couldn't accurately measure; and Beelzebub sighed. "Azrael is one of the most possessive, jealous, over-protective idiots there are in this universe. But he's also unquestioningly loyal, dependable, understanding, tolerant—" The ghost of a wry smile flitted across his mouth, "—and completely in love with you."

Lilith shifted uncomfortably in her seat, her cheeks a delicate shade of pink that reflected both pressure and embarrassment. It wasn't the confirmation of her guardian's feeling for her that was disturbing, but the way Beelzebub seemed so certain she would follow in the footsteps of the woman who had come before her. He spoke with an air of someone who simply expected no less and nothing more.

She had no desire to hurt him, nor had she ever intended to. But what if the demon was right, and she could never justify turning her back on the parts of herself that kept trying to push Azrael away? What if by hovering in an indecisive state she fated herself to repeat the actions of his former flame – if not via betrayal, then via finding she was too damaged to let him close to her?

Almost as though he could hear her thoughts, Beelzebub leaned slightly forward. "He knows your fears, and probably better than you do. It's the companionship he needs more than anything else. I'm pretty sure he'd consider it a duty to give you however much personal space that you need."

For a moment she said nothing, merely looked at him, studying. And then…

"I can't tell; are you trying to push me toward or away from him?" Her tone was soft, devoid of strong feeling, but he caught the hint of distress that colored the question. She was troubled and he knew why. She wasn't the first girl in the world to not know what she wanted.

Rising from his seat, Beelzebub maneuvered crossed the room to approach the wall of pictures. He reached toward his visitor, beckoning her to where he stood, gazing at one of the images at level with his eyes. Though she followed as he bid, she did so slightly more clumsily in her haste to receive a reply, catching her foot on the leg of her chair on her way to pause at his side.

The image was a photograph, old enough to be from the late 1940's, but not to the point of yellowed ages long before. While just weeks ago she wouldn't have known him but for a pretty face, the angel's profile was as beautiful and perfect as the real thing did now, ageless and splendid even though dirt and what looked suspiciously like blood smeared his pale cheek and streaked his fine gold hair. Yet it was his eyes that struck her; darker than the night sky, a violet she somehow knew would be so deep that it bordered on the edge of black and utterly, vacantly _soulless._

It was Azrael, certainly, but not the gentle, soft-spoken entity she found familiar. He was just a face here, an empty shell as lifeless as a statue, empty of the feeling that always seemed to radiate through his skin. It was terrible, cold and uncaring, and indifferent. She knew without being told that this had been a Death closed off from his emotion to protect himself from pain, and in its place there had been a black, poisonous void; a grim reaper in the place of the angel of death.

Her eyes were prickling with what felt horribly like tears, her green irises over-bright when she turned to the demon still gazed solemnly at the photograph. "_Why__—_" she choked; her voice barely louder than a whisper, a toneless breath of air while the tissues surrounding her heart seemed to fray under the impossible question she couldn't speak.

_Why does it hurt me so badly to see?_

He managed a smile, tawny irises brimming with what could possibly have been the beginnings of hope. "You need to know." Silver hair flashing, Beelzebub gave a quiet exhale and turned his back to the wall of memories, unable to bear them any longer. "To answer your question, I'm not doing either. It's up to you to decide whether or not to accept him, and your decision whether or not to take what comes with him."

She glanced back toward the image, once more studying the sharp unpleasant lines that bordered cruelty there in the face of her angel. Yet she only managed for the briefest of moments before recoiling. "But why me?" It was a hopeless, desperate cry, shallow with uncertainty. "Why choose _me?_"

It was only a question, but he could already tell that his effort had not gone to waste when he saw the ardent feeling brimming beneath the surface of her lost-looking expression. "You're his fantasy," he answered simply, "and because sometimes the heart knows what can heal it."

A moment later his playful nature seemed to come rushing back to him. "Besides," he added, his smile perfectly and wickedly crooked, "in my professional opinion, someone has to start instructing you in the finer arts of sex. You're too good-looking for celibacy."

Her cheeks burned with her blush, which she did her best to hide by ducking her head. "Nonsense," she muttered as he roared with laughter and sent her a sly, good-natured wink.


	16. Sugar Spun Promises

**Chapter 15  
**Sugar-Spun Promises

Recommended Listening: "Niton (The Reason)" by Eric Prydz [feat. Jan Burton]

* * *

Lilith spent an hour and a half in Beelzebub's care, the majority of which he had spent rifling through his paperwork muttering exasperated, colorful curses and she had spent browsing the pictures that littered his wall. Once the clock had just passed the five after seven o'clock mark Azrael returned to escort her home.

He had contained an air of tightly concealed frustration, seemingly indicating that whatever errand he had pursued had gone in vain and an anxiousness to have the day done. Feeling slightly shyer than normal in the presence of the subject of a considerably strange conversation, she had greeted him with a small smile, averting her eyes when he asked if she was ready to leave.

But before she'd had the chance to exit the prince's office, Beelzebub had snared her arm between his fingers and gave her a meaningful look. "Remember what I said," he had murmuredand released her with a parting farewell wave to the angel already halfway through the door.

After that, nothing very exciting happened. Azrael had been silent on the way to her apartment, wandering into the sitting room as she pursued a change of clothes that didn't have that lingering smell of smoke. She almost expected him to be gone by the time she finished brushing her hair and teeth and excavating her bookshelf for something to read with her dinner.

"All right, spill."

She looked up from the book's spine, surprised by the sharp hue to the demand. Azrael stood just off the corner leading from the living-dining room and the main hallway, leaning with one shoulder braced against the neutral white wall, powerful arms crossed over his chest. He was watching her with violet eyes that were narrowed with an unusual mixture of doubt and concern.

The expression was a breathtaking one, the keen awareness behind his casual poise and the wisdom behind his jeweled irises glimmering as openly as starlight in a country sky. The sleeves of his pale gray shirt were folded to just beneath his elbows, exposing elegant wrists and sturdy forearms, a suggestion of a comfort he showed only in physical ease with his surroundings. Behind his face there was something else. Something was bothering him; something more than whatever had spooked him earlier.

Bewildered, she struggled to find an answer to a question that didn't make sense. "Spill what?"

He was quick to elaborate, almost anticipating the need to. "What did the demon-child tell you?"

She made no attempt to hide her confusion. "What do you mean?" She frowned, brow furrowed, as she picked at the ragged corner of the cover with fidgety fingers. Surly he hadn't missed Beelzebub's comment; he had superhuman senses, after all, and if he'd heard, why would he need her to repeat it?

His sharp stare hardened, frustration clouding the dusky color with a sheen of gray. "When I leave you everything's fine. I return and you can't look me in the eyes. I'm supposed to think nothing has changed?"

Somehow it had the power to hurt, that twisted knot of worry and awful, dizzying heartache; it pierced her through, a dull burning in her chest that echoed the pain he felt. The harshness of it lashed out with the accuracy and brutal sting of a whip. She satisfied the urge to cringe or back away by ducking her head with a wordless apology.

He was right. She _had_ been avoiding his eyes, just as he said; afraid that if she met that gentle, unnatural gaze, he would see her fears and insecurities, the deepest, darkest things that dragged her self-esteem through a lake of broken glass.

She had taken Beelzebub's words with a heavy grain of salt, unable to go where he had directed her to tread with a ready mind. But it couldn't be true. That she could affect an angel so strongly was purely an exaggeration of the sense of attraction, affection warped by familiarity and comfort. Just a fantasy.

And that was what the demon had called her; Azrael's _fantasy_. Yet that was absurd! Azrael couldn't actually want a simple little thing like her, the idea was inconceivable. She was cowardly, scarred, mentally and physically dysfunctional – she wasn't even very pretty, not nearly enough to be compared with him.

All the same, doubt wasn't an excuse to cause him worry. The last thing she wanted was to hurt him, even if it was via an unwitting slurge of self-consciousness.

"I'm sorry," she whispered even as she realized that it hadn't been anger which tinged his tone with iron, but concern.

He sighed, his voice reaching the very depth of softness when he corrected her. "No, Sweetling, _I_ am sorry. I have no right to lose my temper with you, not ever. But it worries me to see you this withdrawn." She glanced up in time to see his eyes close, one hand settling over the bridge of his straight nose, fingertips resting against his marble cheek as if warding off a headache. "I wish I knew what the Brat-Prince said to frighten you so."

Her bare feet made a subdued noise against the carpet as she passed him by, crossing the floor to the small table set before the window overlooking the intersection outside.

It was long past sunset now, the sky streaked with the shades of twilight. Deep, soulful blues, mourning violets, and raging burgundy smeared together like paints upon a palette, starless for the blare of city lights. She wouldn't have admitted it out loud for fear of sounding too much like some flowery, long-dead poet, but he reminded her of nighttime. Not of darkness, for he was neither black nor brooding, but of a night sky full of stars; giving everything he touched a small bit of majesty.

Even _she_ felt altered – bettered – by his presence there.

"He didn't frighten me," she assured him, placing the well-loved book on the little table strewn with shadow of the lamp.

"Oh?" The word was spoken with the faintest edge of hurt, skeptical but never accusing. He didn't believe her. She heard the doubt in the tone he used, but she didn't get time to marvel at how she somehow could after only a few weeks of knowing him. "And yet you can't bear to look at me…"

The words died in his throat when she turned and lifted her eyes to his, a gentle reprimand held in their soft green depths, as though asking him how he could even think it.

Almost immediately the stiff edge to his demeanor softened; somehow soothed by the simple courtesy within her consent to look at him. It was then that she remembered how long he had dealt with her ignorance of his existence – without connection, without even the small comfort of eye-contact. It was as though he had been terrified that if he so much as blinked, she might vanish right before his eyes.

But when she had looked at him, everything around him had relaxed, eased and gentled with a kind of peaceful radiance that she had never seen in anyone else. It touched her in a way she didn't expect. The suggestion that nothing more than a turn of her head could give him peace was a powerful thing.

She wondered if he could really read things in her scent as Beelzebub had hinted. Could she really catch his attention so vividly? Was he _really_ so attracted to her? It didn't seem feasible, but then again, she hadn't believed in angels before meeting him, either.

Leftover worry still marked the space between them, causing her to insist, "I'm not afraid," even while she felt the heat of a blush creep across her cheeks.

The smile he gave her was so forlorn and lovely that it might have made her feel like crying. "But you're anxious."

"No," she denied quickly, turning her back to him and fussing with the vase of daisies that were in rather desperate need of water.

"_Sum'isen._" The murmur was soothing and smooth. She could almost feel his posture shift to the side as his hip joined the shoulder propped against the wall. "You don't have to lie for my benefit."

The foreign word sank upon her like warm honey, sweet and golden and bold. Its meaning was unknown to her, but it gave her the sense of being implored, as though the sound was the very essence of enticement and pleading._ Come,_ it told her, _come and share your burden with me. _

The power of the language – whatever it was – was a kind of ecstasy when spoken with his voice. It was a lush, velvety meld of color and sound that brought the richest flavors of speech as it was meant to be heard. And as her skin warmed and her spirits lifted, it brought an underlying whisper of a strong, deep-rooted devotion lying beneath the cool expression he chose to wear. Something she shouldn't have been able to feel.

Though her own voice was meek and watery in comparison, she spoke. "I'm not lying, and I'm not anxious. Just—overwhelmed."

To admit it felt good. He deserved more, too, but she didn't know how to put words to her bewilderment. The confession would have told him how much she wanted shrink and hide like the coward she was, would have bared her soul to the world, regardless of what it would do to her once she set it free. She wanted to say so much, but how could she when the words wouldn't come unstuck from the roof of her mouth?

The melody of his voice cut through her uneasy silence. "Keep your secrets. I needn't know every thought that enters your mind, nor every wish you hold in your heart." He laughed gently, the sound like the tinkling chime of tiny bells, enough to tell her that he had somehow managed to understand.

"Why are you here?"

The question startled him. She felt his surprise as a cool pause in his breath, a tiny hitch in the remnants of his laughter. Truly, even she wasn't sure what had caused the question to come blurting out of her mouth. She supposed that it boiled down to wonderment, a curiosity based in whys that she wasn't sure she could ever put voice to, and so she settled with one that came easily to her tongue.

His answer was brief, relaxed, touching softly to her ears. "Because I want to be."

Lilith stood with her back to him, her eyes to the window, painfully aware of the quiescent eyes boring into her shoulder blades like bright, burning gems. He hadn't answered her question, not really. Obviously he wanted to be in her company, otherwise he would have left her – but she wanted to know whyhe cared_._ She wanted to know the answers to all those _whys._

Why her? Why had _she_ caught his eye? Why hadn't _he_ told her instead of leaving it for his demon friend to explain? Why did he seem so completely devoted to her? Love wasn't realistically so unconditional; so what was it that kept him so close, for need, for comfort, or for company?

"Why are you here _now?"_

His steps made no noise upon the floor. He moved in utter silence, with the impossible quiet of a great cat, until he stood just behind her. She could almost feel the smile lift the corners of his lips; the calm, charming smile of a man completely comfortable with himself and his environment.

"Is that the polite way to ask me what I want from you?"

There was a soft, teasing lilt to the question aimed towards soothing her uneasy mind. The intent was soothing, but it was very difficult for her to be calm when the strong, steady heat of his body suddenly pressed into her back. She nearly shied away, intimidated, but his long, slender fingers curled around her shoulders in a gesture meant both to stop her and bid her to relax.

"The answer is easy enough for me to voice," he began slowly, "though it may be difficult for you to hear, you have the right to know. Forgive me for being blunt."

"What?"

She half-turned to face him but Azrael stopped her, his grip about her shoulders tightening only to ask for her patience and trust. "You asked me what I want, and so I'll tell you." The fingers of one pale hand brushed the loose, dark hair back from her face, his voice both pensive and gentle in murmur. "All I want—all I ever wanted—is you."

Her stomach leapt into her throat when she felt his lips brush the shell of her ear, his breath hot as it grazed her skin. The touch roused a piercing, shivery joy that was tempered by the unease that curdled in the pit of her stomach. Simultaneously delighted and terrified by the attention, she tried to muster a response. But how, and with what? How could she possibly reply to a comment like that?

Struck dumb, she could merely stand there, still, doll-like, as Azrael's fingers combed softly through the dark tresses that spilled past her shoulders.

"The way you hum to every song on the radio you know," he whispered, the very sound a reverence. The fingertips of each powerful hand trailed down her temples and across cheeks flushed with a shy, breathless chagrin.

His thumb brushed her lower lip, lingering there for a brief, wistful moment before both hands slipped into a gentle circle around her throat, a soft caress of skin. "The curl of your toes when you read. The way you hold yourself with such confidence when you dance, and the utter happiness I see in your face when you perform."

Lilith's breath hitched when his touch trailed down and under the length of her arms, just brushing the delicate inside of her wrists just before they settled at her waist. She struggled to remember how to breathe while he leaned slightly forward, pressing the length of his torso to her back. His breath curved with the arc of her neck, one smooth, half-hollowed cheek brushing the edge of her jaw-line.

Was it normal to feel like she was burning up with a fever?

His skin was warm against hers, unnaturally so, scorching her down to the bone until she was nearly delirious with a strange, unconscious delight. "The way you dress, the faces you make when you apply makeup, your ritual for breaking in new shoes. Your steadfast love for your friends. The gentleness in your smiles."

The touch of wide palms sliding to rest upon her upper thighs made her flesh burn as though she were kneeling on an open patch of coals, the acknowledgement of so intimate a touch kicking the pace of her heartbeat several notches up the Richter scale.

"_All_ of you."

Behind the blinding distraction of his words and touch she realized that the choice she had made in clothing seemed both poor and naïve, though it was a miracle that she could think of anything but his lips against her jugular. The pair of navy flannel pajama shorts and light pink camisole would definitely not have been her first pick had she known he'd planned on staying. They felt too tight and too revealing, too vulnerable to his eyes and skimming fingertips regardless of his gentlemanly consideration of her boundaries.

He was both polite and playful enough to push her just the tiniest bit, toeing the line between what she could deem to be romantically scandalous and what triggered the neuroses of her paranoia. He understood her. He knew her fears as well as he knew that she tended to choke when she laughed too hard.

With his nose tucked into the hollow just beneath her ear, buried in her hair, he tucked the tips of his fingers beneath the hem of her shorts. It was a subtle shift, absent of any real motive other than a physical sign of affection, but the light graze of his well-kempt fingernails against the bare flesh of her thighs coaxed a dizzying warmth to coil about her insides.

It was like being trapped between two doors. Behind one was the way to following her uneasy brain's advice and putting immediate space between herself and the angel at her back. Behind the other, the one that housed that blindingly absurd portion of her inner self squealed with delight, reveling in the attention of the inhumanly beautiful man. And somehow the whys didn't seem all that important.

He inhaled deeply and a soft sigh escaped his perfect lips, a distinctly contented sound edged with some other pleasure. The curve of his smile was gentle against her earlobe, spiced with something that might have been more.

It was true, just as Beelzebub had said – he really _did_ like her smell. And yet whatever her paranoia hissed about how perilous her position was, so helpless and alone with this creature so easily capable of overpowering her, she just couldn't bring herself to fear him. Not even when she felt his cool lips touch a soft, searing kiss to that tender little space below her earlobe, the gesture lingering, praising and terribly bewitching.

Somehow she found her voice, though it was distant and weak for a small lack of breath. "Are you trying to…seduce me?"

He laughed, hugging her securely about the hips with the same arms that had once pulled her from the path of a car. "No, sweet one. At least not intentionally. But you do tend to bring out this side of me despite my good intentions." He paused, breath stilling against the base of her neck. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, um—"

"Would you like me to?"

"I don't…" she squeaked, the pace of her heart a haphazard pounding against her ribs.

She felt air at her back for a fraction of a second, just long enough for him to gather a firmer grip around her waist. In a flash, movement so quick that it was nearly untraceable by her human eyes, he had spun her around and pressed her back firmly against the nearest wall, the room's colors and textures warping in the speed.

She peered up at him, intimidated by the unfamiliar harshness when he was usually so careful with her. But when she saw him smiling fondly down at her, she realized that he was only pretending to be hard and forceful; teasing, playing.

Azrael braced his forearms against the wall behind her, one framing each of her shoulders, his violet eyes quiet and sincere when he murmured, "I wouldn't try to seduce you even if I knew no other way to be close to you. It isn't honest, and it's a dirty way to grasp a woman's emotions." He touched the tip of one finger to the hollow of her throat. "I'd much rather _appeal_ to your senses than manipulate them."

Lilith's cheeks flamed with a blush. Appeal to her senses. The most beautiful man she had ever laid eyes upon was talking of appealing to_ her?_ It was strange to hear such things. She had always been under the impression that it was the woman's job to inspire the man into doing whatever was needed to conceive children. Yet honesty lined his words and softened the timeless, carven angles of his face.

Shyly she lowered her eyes, unsure of how to respond, and hurriedly averted her gaze from his lower body – and the firm flesh encased in the clinging cloth of his slacks.

He laughed again, but this time it was softer, gentler, and meant to reassure. "You don't have to be shy. What your body tells you is natural, not a sin."

"_You're_ not shy at all," she mumbled, not quite sure whether the inflexion was from feeling impressed or resentful.

Casually, he shrugged. Her discomfort wasn't unknown to him; which was why he felt it necessary to prove to her that she was neither inadequate nor ill-suited to being so close to him. She was simply inexperienced, nothing more. "I'm also older than you are."

His eyes darkened infinitesimally when he took a careful scan of her emotional core, feeling the range and timbre of the feeling he sensed roiling just under her skin. She wavered on the brink of distress with herself, unhappy with her timidity. That was unnecessary. There was no real reason to fret so much, but it was in her nature; a trait he was quite familiar with.

Determined to reassure her, he touched a steady hand to the underside of her chin and tilted her face upwards, studying the sweet slope of her cheeks and small, delicate nose. He just barely brushed her skin, fingertips brushing down to the line of her neck to feel the fluttered pulse of breath and blood beneath them. But with that touch he felt something else; something more worrying than mere breath. He stilled before cupping her face in his hands. "You are trembling."

"Am I?" She whispered, feeling stunned and slightly tipsy, not that she had any record of drunkenness for comparison. "I suppose I'm not used to this kind of thing—"

"Shh," he laid a finger across her lips in order to silence her shaky explanation. "I know. But try not to think about it. That's my job."

Lilith lifted her eyes to Azrael's face, heavily shadowed by its own sharp lines under the night's spread of darkness. There was a strange light in his eyes – colored with that blue-violet shade he seemed to reserve just for her – irises clouded with an expression she couldn't interpret. "I don't understand," she stated, softly, and meant every word.

The humble declaration of innocence brought him another smile. She was so beautiful; so soft, quiet, and compassionate. She inspired in him a powerful want to protect her, a want to make her happy, and a deep, desperate desire for her touch. A desire so potent that ate at him like an acid and corroded his heart. But he knew better than to push her too hard.

The hungers that raged at the cage he stored them in were just that: hungers. Impulses could be curbed and stored away, baser needs forgotten when it was pointless to give them attention. He had gone hungry in more than this in his long, weary existence.

However easy it might have been to lose himself in the smoothness of her pretty skin and the sugared, lily-soft scent of her; his need for companionship was nothing next to her need for comfort and security. She was shy and delicate, unaccustomed to the ideas he was introducing to her, and he respected her far too much to force her hand.

Gently freeing her from the playful restrain of his arms, he turned to face the window. "You shouldn't worry about inexperience; it's not that large an issue."

For the second time she found herself no less than touched by the acknowledgement of her insecurities, and watched as he retreated to give her more breathing space. He stood with his profile to her, the harsh line of his cheekbone casting a hollowing shadow over his face, his arms had settled casually and peacefully at his sides; but as collected as he seemed, he looked faintly disheartened.

A small place in her chest ached from the lack of his touch; a feeling not unlike being lonely, but which seemed out of place with her instinctual unease. As she studied it, realization hit her like a brick and she knew – just _knew_ – that he would continue to respect, protect, and treasure her no matter what she said, did or thought.

Did she still fear him? Yes, a little, but it wasn't enough to drive her away.

She stepped tentatively beside him, inching nearer and nearer until he was forced to lift his arm and allow her to tuck beneath it. "I trust you," she said, smiling softly when the warm band of muscle slipped around her waist and held her to his side. She could sense his gratitude, and the warm flush of affection that passed from his skin to hers as he adjusted to her closeness and what it represented.

"_And it came to pass," _he murmured, his eyes filled with the liquid colors of the dusky sky, _"that the Son of God saw the daughter of man, that she was fair; and though law made her untouchable she would be forever beloved by Heaven's Mercy."_

A supple shiver thin and fine as lace trickled down her back, spreading from the nape of her neck down to her tailbone. What her brain couldn't, her body could apparently recognize as words that contained power; not a power of force or volume or intent, but of a raw, ungoverned nature that crackled like electricity in the air during a thunder storm. She might not have recognized the context, but she understood what they meant.

And, frankly, it was impossible not to be at least a little flattered that he had formatted something akin to Scripture around her.

A deep, shuddering breath filled his lungs before he gave her a gentle squeeze and took a step back. Regret and yearning were engraved in every line of his face. "I should go. I still have tasks to complete before the day ends."

Lilith nodded, understanding the call of work, but she couldn't help feeling slightly crestfallen. Whatever she had been expecting, it hadn't been a simple retreat…or was it simply that she didn't want to be alone? Shouldn't she have been grateful that he was giving her space?

Noticing the gray in her expression, he added, "I'll be back in a few days. I promise."

Her head ducked in a voiceless consent. When she opened her eyes and looked up, he was nowhere to be seen, having left the room as effortlessly and completely as a breath of air. She felt the ghostly touch of gentle lips brush her cheek just before the sense of complete solitude informed her that he was gone. But this time his departure left her feeling neither lonely nor abandoned, but content and fulfilled and just a little eager.

With a meek, somewhat silly smile, not unlike that of a schoolgirl with a crush, she picked up her book and trotted off to bed, wondering under what circumstances she would see her angel next.

...

It was bitter cold the next morning, but the sun was out, dispersing the chilly kind of radiance it saved especially for winter. The all-time cold temperature records for November had been broken twice already, and the thin sheen of ice upon the roadways was causing accident after accident for unwary Seattleites.

Lilith was just approaching the back door to the library when Sarah's little red Chevy truck pulled into the parking lot and paused to wait for her friend. The fire-haired woman was swearing up a storm. Between curses she reiterated the story of some boneheaded idiot who had taken a left-turn directly in front of an ambulance, while everyone _sane_ had stopped and pulled over. Yet the rant was short-lived. Once Sarah got a good look at Lilith, she was grinning as widely as a cat with a mouse in its paws.

"Look at _you!_" she teased, wiggling her eyebrows and leaning forward to whisper in a distinctly conspiratorial manner, "don't tell me little miss prudent actually enjoyed her date?"

With a snort, Lilith shoved Sarah indoors to get out of the cold. It was inconvenient that the redhead had happened to witness Azrael coming to meet her yesterday, but she feigned ignorance, repeating, "date?" with an air of mild, uncaring confusion.

Sarah scoffed as they peeled off their winter layers and hung them in the closet. "I saw the two of you run off together. You weren't kidding either, that boy is one _hell_ of a babe," she whistled appreciatively, "nice piece of man there, if I ever saw one."

Laughing, Lilith agreed, "you _would_ know."

"Very funny." Sarah walked to the automated check-in machine, changing it to open-hours mode as she arranged her face in an expression which seemed especially designed for dragging sympathy. If Lilith hadn't known better she might have thought the redhead was about to cry. "Come on," Sarah pleaded, "aren't you going to tell me how he put that glow in your cheeks?"

Lilith scowled, turning on and signing in to the staff computers arranged upon work tables and desks alike. "Get your brain out of the gutter," she muttered, "it was nothing like that."

The red-head rolled her eyes, pouting like a little girl. "I'm your best friend. You're supposed to _talk_ to me about these things!"

A single brown eyebrow lifted to emphasize a look of wary skepticism. "What things?"

"_You know!"_ Sarah whined, pulling the nearest full bookdrop bin toward the machine's loading counter. "Dirty little details into your hot new romance!"

The laughter burst from Lilith's mouth. "My_ what?_" she choked between giggles. "We went to the _museum,_ Sarah! What do you want me to say?"

"I don't know…that you made out in an alley somewhere afterward—come _on!_ Throw me a lead here!"

Lilith shrugged with a noncommittal lack of concern, shooting Sarah a quiet smile as she opened a plastic tote of books requested by patrons to sort and shelve. She lifted books, music, and movies from the tote, checking their hold slips for the names of their requesters and stacking them on the three-level black metal cart in alphabetical order.

"He didn't even _kiss_ you?"

Regardless of her efforts, Lilith couldn't quite banish the blush that warmed her cheeks, triggered by the innocent question. Correction: nothing that came out of Sarah's mouth was ever _completely_ innocent. It had been a test, because if Lilith had either responded negatively or with no reaction, then she would have given up. But Sarah was an expert at sensing such tiny displays of discomfort; she had been absolutely terrible when poor Alice had started dating her boyfriend Elijah.

Try as she may, there was no way Lilith could avoid whatever Sarah chose to dish at her_._ And sure enough, like a bloodhound the redhead pounced, shrieking like a tea-kettle, "he _did!_ I _knew_ it. _Yes!_ Five bucks for me!"

Lilith gaped, both bemused and horrified. "You were _betting_ on me?"

Sarah considered this. "Actually, we were betting on him. Janelle didn't think he'd have the balls to try it again, but I bet her a five that he would." Cheshire cat grin plastered on her face, she giggled and nudged her stunned friend in the ribs. "That settles it! We're going shopping right after work."

That caught Lilith off-guard. A shopping trip? She had been expecting to hear more questions; questions about why she hadn't told anyone, what it had been like, or how good of a kisser Azrael was. "What for?"

Sarah's doe brown eyes were soft with an affectionate pity. "Oh honey," she cooed, "you're so naïve, it's cute."

Lilith scowled at her, miffed by being called naïve, until Sarah crossed the backroom to sit in the chair next to her and gently patted her shoulder. "I've seen your underwear supply, and it needs some serious rehabilitation."

"My underwear…needs to be rehabilitated?" Lilith quirked an eyebrow. "My underwear is just fine, thanks."

"No, it's not," Sarah retorted dryly. "Plain cotton panties and boyshorts do _not_ equal sexy."

Lilith sighed, torn between tired amusement and mild annoyance. "That's because, Sarah, dear, being sexy is not one of my priorities. There are much more important things on my mind right now—like, work, for example."

"It is now," the redhead's tone was blunt. "Or it had better be, if you want to keep that gorgeous piece of man-flesh all to yourself, which I'm sure you do."

"No, Sarah."

The redhead dropped the book on CD she had been transferring to a new case with a loud clatter. Her stare was appalled. "You don't want to keep him? Are you _insane?_"

"_No,_ Sarah," Lilith repeated patiently, scanning and opening another tote. "No to the underwear."

"Oh, that." Sarah shrugged, looking visibly relieved that her friend hadn't completely lost her marbles. "Well, tough cookies. Because there's no _way_ I'm letting my girl waltz into a relationship unprepared. We are going shopping and that's final."

"_Why?_" Lilith wailed, dejected and unhappy. She was not a fan of clothes shopping to begin with, and underwear even more. Something about poking around in a department store crowded with irritable people and over-priced clothing just bothered her, especially if a measuring tape and a severe limit on her personal space were involved.

"_Because,_" Sarah explained, "then if you ever decide to dress up for your boy, you'll have something to wear. Pretty lingerie does wonders for the ego, let me tell you."

When Lilith simply made a face at her, she added, "look at it this way—I'll buy you things whether you come or not. But if you tag along, I'll let you have a say."

"But—"

"No buts, missy. You _will _be getting pretty undies if I have to buy them all for you and glue the bag to your dresser, got it?"

She thought about protesting; really, seriously considered it. But Sarah was so set in her demands that there was really nothing Lilith could say to dissuade the imminent excursion. That was the thing about Sarah; once she made up her mind, unless she changed it _herself,_ it was set in stone. She was tenacious enough to accept pestering people into getting her way.

Grudgingly, Lilith returned to her work. At first she occupied her wandering brain by counting down the minutes until her so-called friend dragged her off to the mall for a miniature session of torture in the largest Victoria's Secret outlet at their disposal. But after a while her thoughts wandered in the direction of Azrael, and the expression that might cross that ridiculously handsome face of his if he discovered she was being forced to buy new underwear for his sake.

Just thinking about it made her slightly nauseous.

If it would keep Sarah happy, she would grit her teeth and do it; after all, tagging along might allow her to exercise some control over the store-crazy redhead. But there was no way she was going to wear any of whatever purchases might be made. _No_ way. The day she would parade around in lingerie for her guardian the day hell froze over.

...

The fact that the mall was hellishly crowded due to the raging cold outside did absolutely nothing to alter Sarah's die-hard determination to engage in an evening of celebratory shopping. And of course, to Sarah, the fact that Lilith had found a man she deemed worthy of joining for a date without any outside pressure to force her into it was a definite cause for celebrating. Besides, Sarah wouldn't have considered passing up a chance to expose her prude little wannabe-nun to a good run of underwear shopping.

The redhead's enthusiasm and support were touching, but Lilith was still little less than pleased to be kidnapped for a free-for-all in a store littered with high-priced underwear. She would have much rather gone home for a nice bath and a good book after her shift. Her complaints had fallen on deaf ears, not that she had expected any different.

The Victoria's Secret in the mall was not altogether very intimidating from the outside. It was when she was irresolutely towed through the opening between glass windows lined with pink-edged posters of young women flaunting their black-and-white bra and panty sets that she found her self overwhelmed.

The spacious store was crammed with clean, drawer-lined bins of underwear in almost every color imaginable. From the cute to the crude, from floral to animal-print, lace and satin to cotton and micro cloth; bras, slips and tiny nightdresses hung on special racks along the walls, along with garments the names of which she didn't know. There were even Plexiglas shelves lined with bottles of perfume.

Feeling overwhelmed and slightly nauseous, Lilith trailed behind her friend as though seeking protection, following in Sarah's wake as the redhead made a beeline toward a section housing skimpy, satiny things.

"No point in poking around the cutesy stuff," Sarah chirped, "I could tell just by Jelly's descriptions, Adrian's not in to that. Lucky girl, finding a man with class!"

She paused at one of the bins, poking briefly through a display of tiny monstrosities Lilith thought it better to pretend she didn't notice. Until Sarah bent to the drawers underneath to and rose holding two pairs in front of the brunette's face. "What d'you think—black or white?"

Lilith blinked at the tiny bits of satin and lace being waved in front of her. "I—"

"Black? I think so too. It'll stand out next to your skin." Sarah stuffed the garment into Lilith's hand. "Oh look! It has a matching bra!"

This, too, was shoved into a bewildered Lilith's arms before Sarah dragged her toward a second bin and subjected to another moment of pawing, sizing, and having more underwear shoved into her keeping.

By the time ten minutes had gone by, Lilith had had more underwear waved under her nose than she had owned since she had turned eighteen. Almost four years worth of bras, thongs and bikini-cut panties flashed in and out of her clutch. Even a strange, camisole-reminiscent garment fashioned of sheer, dark green cloth and white ribbon that Sarah called a _bustier _had taken a brief journey across her arm_._ It was later replaced by a sleek, silky red thing that was more slip than nightdress.

This she was doomed to try on and display, much to her displeasure, yet at Lilith's protest Sarah rolled her eyes and ushered her into a dressing room stall. When the brunette let her dutifully in to appraise, Sarah cooed and complimented her and the slip, plucking at the short, thin skirt and noting with pleasure that the slit side-seams allowed for a stunning display of thigh.

Sarah left her to change back into her clothes, allowing Lilith to lean against the stall's bolted door and try to prevent herself from tearing the horrible little scrap of satin from her skin as though it was a poisonous spider. She reached for the hanger, eager to be rid of the thing, and glanced toward the mirror at the stall's sponge-painted wall. There she paused.

What she had thought originally to be something gaudy was actually quite simple. The slip wasn't tastelessly embellished with faux jewels, mesh and frills as many of the others Sarah had considered. It had curved graceful seams that draped rather than confined her body, with off-shoulder sleeves and just a tiny bit of lace to accent and draw attention to the slight dip over the breasts.

Straightening, she turned her shoulders to glimpse the back and the decorative lacing that cinched the fabric to the torso. Her hands smoothed down the sides of the silky cloth that fell almost to her knees, the rich scarlet striking against her white skin. In the place of a plain, shy girl she saw an attractive young woman with soft dark hair and a face that was close enough to what was called heart-shaped to be pleasing.

Admitting that Sarah's choice had been a good one was easier than accepting that in the slinky slip she felt pretty. All the same, the facts remained when ego and denial were stripped away by treated glass, and for the first time since being dragged into the frilly hell of lingerie, she dared to wonder what Azrael would think if he saw her.

She remembered the way his eyes had lit up when he had seen her in that God-forsaken black-and-white floral dress; the darkened gleam so intent upon the fitted fabric and the skin it had left bare. And this scrap of what couldn't even be called clothing was so much more daring than the dress had been. Would he look at her like that again if she ever wore something like this in his presence? Would he kiss her like her had upon her living room couch?

Remembrance brought back the sensation of his strong, gentle hands sliding along the line of her bare thighs and the whisper of his lips against the curve of her throat.

Alarm and confusion was quick to combat the warm spike in her heart-rate. Disgusted with herself for getting misty-eyed over something that would never happen again, she stripped off the slip and replaced it with the safe comfort of her jeans and cardigan.

What did she care if he appreciated skimpy clothes? Most men did; why should he be any different? It didn't matter anyway, because there was no way she would ever wear the things in front of him. She would rather die a hundred painful deaths than degrade herself in such a way.

Yet when she emerged to Sarah's inquiry as to whether Lilith needed her to carry anything, Lilith declined; choosing instead to keep the slip draped over her own arm with the basket piled with the redhead's other finds. She still managed to appear stoically resigned, but Sarah noticed the pink flush in her friend's pale cheeks and the way she seemed calmer – even _happier_ – about the whole thing.

"This is so much fun!" Sarah chirped, watching as Lilith bravely dipped a hand into a bin of lace panties. "I always have problems with colors clashing with my hair, but at least _one_ of us looks good in red!" She giggled when Lilith made a genuinely disgusted face and all but tossed the garment she had been studying away from her upon finding the open seam where the juncture of the thighs would be.

Nose wrinkled, Lilith mused morosely; "People are sick."

"Hey, hey," Sarah defended pointedly, "don't diss it until you've tried it!" Lilith gave her a withering look glance. "I'm not saying I have, but it's only polite. Anyway, I think I've done as much damage as I'm going to be allowed to. Just give me a sec and I'll go pay." With that, the redhead plucked the basket from her friend's elbow and made to approach the counter.

"No you don't," Lilith caught Sarah by the wrist and pulled her back. "These prices are insane! You're not spending this much money on me."

One hand on her hip, Sarah retorted, "oh, so you'd buy it if I left you alone? The next thing I know, you'd be halfway home with everything hidden back where it all came from!"

True, she probably would never have spent so much money on so little clothing if left up to her own decisions, but the idea of someone else spending so much on her made her feel guilty enough to reconsider. She would much rather put everything back and go home, not that this was an option.

"Tell you what," Sarah offered, sensing Lilith's bleak mood, "how about we split it? Would that make you feel better?"

Lilith frowned at her. "No."

"Well tough, because that's the way it's going to be."

Much bickering later, the two women exited the store arm-in-arm; Sarah with a bright, happy shopping-induced high and Lilith looking for all the world as though someone had just died. In her unoccupied hand she clutched a striped pink bag, the contents of which included two sets of undergarments in black satin-and-lace and a pale pink, three lacy thongs in dark green, lime green and white with blue stripes, and the red slip. All of which she silently vowed never to wear, touch, or even think about ever again.


	17. Male Driven Fact Based Logic

**Chapter 16  
**Male-Driven Fact-Based Logic

Recommended Listening: "Hunter" by 30 Seconds to Mars and "The Fragile" by Nine Inch Nails

* * *

She exhaled, letting her body go absolutely and completely still as he swept her up and over the arm at her waist; his strength shielding her, carrying her as if she weighed no more than goose-down. The flesh of her calves curled around his knees. Her palms clutched the plain white shirt pulled tight across his shoulders as she let her back arch. Effortless and graceful, he swung her down again, following the subtle cue within the thrumming drive of the music.

The sounds were so rhythmic and predictable, but his movement was riveting and compelling, controlling even. But with every sliver of touch came a reminder. While the choreography was raw and needing, he never did anything but guide her forward, politely requesting her trust. It was something benign, often buried beneath all the other things that passed during the minutes that flew steadily by – but while they were dancing, it was all he ever asked of her.

She slid to the floor, rolling from his grip and slipping from the tangle of limbs to sit up with a rolling contraction of stomach muscles. They were sore after a solid three-day stretch of practices. The effort hurt, but it was a sweet sort of ache, as the stretching pain always was to her.

While she couldn't see the face concealed by the curled kneeling pose he had adopted beside her – bent as though in the greatest internal agony – she took advantage of the brief pause to look at him. A strange kind of affection curled around her insides as she gazed down at the tight gathering of fair hair that accented the strong line of his neck.

Roughly half a week had trickled by since she had been _babysat _by the demon prince. Work had been brutal due to a mass of local high school students mobbing the poor librarians for help in the task of locating proper reference books for a mock-United Nations debate. The circulation workers had been besieged by students with requests to book the public computers and study rooms to assemble their arguments. Her sleep schedule had been interrupted by pulling some late nights.

Azrael had left her alone for the first two days, apparently having noticed the confusion mixed with uncertainty that had been eating at her and probably deducing it was best to give her some time to think. He had known right off the bat her thoughts were elsewhere that night, but he had no way to know exactly why.

When she had told him truthfully that she was neither hurt nor frightened, the weight of what she had discussed with the prince of hell hadn't been something she could put aside. She hadn't sworn to be the angel's life companion, but no matter how she looked at it her refusal to be intimidated by the list of Azrael's faults had been akin to a sign of acceptance. Something Beelzebub's words had intended to warn her against if any part of her felt uncertainty.

Yet Azrael had been so hurt, so near to childlike in innocent inability to understand why she had shied from him that her decision was forced out of her more quickly than she could have predicted. It had been as though his heart was breaking and hers followed directly and faithfully behind it. She had known that she must do anything and everything within her power to make the breaking stop.

After intent examination of the encounter, she had had no choice but to come to the conclusion that she had, without a doubt, accepted him as her guardian.

The mad schedule of rehearsals didn't allow her much time to marvel over the how behind the direction her life had taken. Jessica had booked her for three hours that Wednesday split into two separate chunks between her ballet and modern classes, and she had gone to bed feeling too physically and mentally drained to analyze any more. Thursday had been much the same; work, then a run-though of practices for five classes of younger dancers which several of the older girls (including Lilith) helped supervise before a hurried dinner-break, then two practices of her own.

And then Friday had come. She had both dreaded and longed for the duet rehearsal, hoping that she would be prepared enough to face him. It wasn't that she was afraid (even though she was), it was just that the insecurities in her brain would _not_ shut up.

Slowly his head lifted, his expression wiped blank by the concentration devoted to counting beats. But he smiled at her when he met her eyes, mouth adopting the gesture with a kind of melting ease that could have melted her heart. It shouldn't have been legal for someone to be so handsome. She couldn't return the smile because her face was to the nonexistent audience, but she knew the adoring spike in her heart rate was enough of an answer for him. She knew he could hear it.

Forcefully she urged herself to remain perfectly expressionless even when his long, slender fingers curled around her chin, just as choreographed. But there was so much more within his touch than the choreography, something that couldn't be reproduced even by the greatest dancer. Not even the most skillful actor could have copied the gentle, reverential devotion that shone in those beautiful violet eyes when he looked at her.

That was when the music was cut, Jessica's finger lifting from the pause button. Her eyes were bright, her cheerful face drawn with a powerful outward sense of attachment and pride with her students and her work.

"You two are amazing, like I knew you'd be." The instructor jotted some quick notes to herself, nodding with pleasure about the progress being made. "Until next week, then!"

It took Lilith a moment to register the dismissal. Blushing faintly, she got to her feet with a murmured farewell to a smiling Alice and headed for the changing room. Azrael followed behind her, a swift, silent sentinel entering the changing room behind his charge to grab a pair of loose, stone-washed jeans and pulling them on over his knit uniform pants.

"Do you have plans tonight?"

He looked up, slightly startled by the question. It had a hopeful undertone he didn't think he had heard in her voice before; at least not while speaking to him. She was pulling a jacket over her white sweater, a navy blue pinstripe that buttoned down the front and allowed plenty of room for the warm winter scarf she wrapped around her delicate throat.

"Why do you ask?"

"Oh…" She looked down at the floor, at the black-and-white converse sneakers she scuffed bashfully at the vinyl beneath them. "No reason."

That was a lie. He could smell it on her sweet breath, hear it in the slight hesitation of the words, her eagerness for a reply. "I had planned on spending the evening at the Hall."

Her face fell, the pale green of her aura collapsing upon itself. That shimmering sense of hope cracked like glass almost painfully clearly to his inhuman sight. Concern rang in his mind, alarmed by the intensity of the negative reaction, wondering what on earth he could have said to hurt her. Why did she look as though her world was ending?

There was doubt in her voice when she spoke again. "Could—could I go with you?"

His eyebrows lifted, surprise written all over his elegant features. She had wanted to spend time with him, but thought he would deny her? Didn't she know that she merely had to ask and he would have presented her with the moon itself? Was her caution birthed by a fear of pressing him after he had left her to solitude for a time? Was she afraid of rejection, or afraid of his reaction to the polite distance she still wanted?

"Of course you may," he told her gently, zipping up his coat. "I would be glad of your company."

The light, elated smile he received in response was worth all the confusion in the world, as was the glove-covered hand shyly gripping his palm when he offered it. She slung her bag over one shoulder when she accepted his silent gift of protection from the late autumn frost and biting cold.

This simple moment was worth every century of waiting, and something he had hardly dared to hope for. It was worth everything he had suffered; loneliness challenged by the semblance of possibility.

...

He avoided the body-packed dance floor and stage this time, choosing instead to remain in the entry room. It was a quieter chamber, dotted with carefully-spaced tables and the eatery-and-bar at which a handful of people sat and chatted or slumped over their drinks. Now that she looked at it with less wide-eyed intimidation due to a demon-club, Lilith could properly admire the old-style punk-Gothic decor.

Azrael directed her to one of the corner tables, a booth set away from the bar selected for an isolated and sheltered qualities that made it safe as well as private. He slid into the red velvet seat with a contented sigh, clearly happy for the warmth from indoors. A sentiment she shared.

Sinking gratefully into the cushion across from him she sighed and loosened her scarf, watching him remove his gloves with a set of leisurely movements. One hand rose to push back the hood of the plain navy sweatshirt he wore beneath his shiny black coat, causing his pale hair to spill from confinement and down to face-framing freedom. Her heart gave a not-so-subtle lurch beneath her ribs, momentarily robbed of breath by the beauty in such a simple gesture.

They had been settled for barely a moment before they were joined by one of the barmen, dark hair slicked back from his plain face. His cool eyes were calmly polite when he asked, "can I get you anything?"

Azrael greeted the man with a small smile. "A Blood Lotus, double Screwdriver heavy on the vodka, and…"

He paused to regard Lilith with a keen, calculating eye, as deeply as though he were attempting to see right into her. She fidgeted beneath that look, feeling anxious but strangely not uncomfortable. His focus was like the subtle brush of fingertips against her temples, curious, intrigued, searching…

"A Strawberry Daiquiri. No alcohol, please…_hu'manisch_." He averted his gaze back to the waiter. "And could you get a message to His Highness for me?" The man inclined his head. "Tell him to get his white dragon ass down here, I have something for him. Thank you."

"Yes, My Lord Shinigami," the waiter bowed and headed off to fulfill his orders.

Azrael turned back to Lilith to find her eyeing him with a mixture of curiosity and speculation. "What is it?" he asked, head tilting slightly to one side.

"Three things," she replied. "One: dragon?"

He smiled, amused. But it was a secretive sort of smile, just slightly crooked, and she knew he wasn't going to answer completely even before he opened his mouth. "A nickname, of a sort. Two?"

"Why did he call you that? Shin—shin…"

"Shinigami?" She nodded, glad that he had understood to what she was referring. "It's a title of mine used in hell; a Japanese term translating to God—or rather _Being_—of Death. Fitting, no?"

She smiled shyly and nodded a second time, prepared to keep the fact that she liked the name to herself. It fit him; elegant and soft with a subtle, attractive sharpness about it, but he didn't seem to notice her approval, for which she was grateful. He simply prompted, "and three?"

She opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted by the return of the waiter who carried a tray upon which sat three tall glasses. Two of these he placed in front of Azrael – one a violent sunset orange in color, the other a deep crimson swirled with streaks of an even darker red. The last he presented to Lilith, the pale pink color fizzing with the bubbles of carbonated club soda added in place of alcohol. Azrael thanked the man graciously, who bowed a second time and discreetly left, then slid the orange monstrosity aside before taking a sip of his own drink with a sigh of relish.

Lilith watched, entranced, her eyes fixed to the curve of his ivory lips around the edge of the clear glass. He set it back down, the tip of his tongue sliding along the edges of his mouth before fastening his attention back on her bidding her to answer the question still posed.

She gulped, taking in a careful breath, steeling herself as she forced her brain to displace the images of his perfect mouth being replayed over and over in the back of her mind. "Three—why did you guess the Daiquiri?"

His answering grin was smooth and cleverly twisted, his lips curling with an expression of teasing amusement. "About the virginity?"

His warm voice was soft, quiet and dark as velvet, causing her cheeks to flush in response to the implication behind the word. Lowering her eyes, she watched the tips of his fingers as they traced the rim of his glass, pale skin following the smooth circle pattern with a lazy sort of innocence. He let his chin rest in the palm of the other hand, bracing his elbow against the surface of the table as he watched her in turn. "I know many things about you, including your dislike for alcohol."

"I—I meant the strawberry part," she mumbled, tongue feeling numbed and slow, hypnotized by the idle movement of his fingertips.

"Well," he began thoughtfully, "you're a chocolate connoisseur, but not when it comes to cold drinks, so we turn to the other possible flavors. Not too sour or too bland, but something sweet and bright, which brings us to the color pink." She stared at him, not sure whether to be puzzled or amused by the verbal musings, watching his eyes flicker down to the glass sitting before him. "But which to choose: the grapefruit or the cherry?"

Entertained despite herself she leaned closer, enchanted by his beauty in the dark setting and by the lilt of the question. He was a bright jewel amid the twilight surrounding him; pale as porcelain, smooth as silk, fine as spun glass, and strong and hard as diamond.

"Which one?" she pressed, wanting the answer from him and not herself. Maybe it was his voice that was addictive, or maybe it was just being near him, she couldn't be sure.

The movement of his fingers ceased, both palms curving to cradle the glass between them. "Neither. Rather something just between them, neither all sugary nor all bitter. Thus," he indicated her glass with a slight incline of his head, "the strawberry. Was I right?"

Her answer came by way of picking up the glass that sat untouched before her, lifting it to her lips and taking a long, luxurious drink. He was right; it was a perfect mix of sweetness and slightly tart, fizzy and cool. Setting the glass back down with a decisive clink against the wood, she nodded.

"That's an impressive bit of skill," she told him, folding her hands together upon table's smooth surface, "I don't think I knew any of that about myself until you told me."

He shrugged, humbly waving the compliment aside. "No skill, I just know your tastes. That and I'm flirting."

Lilith was just faintly aware of the warm flutter in the pit of her stomach when his eyes lifted to meet hers, violet irises washing with a deep, beautiful blue.

He was flirting with her? Did he honestly feel it was necessary to win her over? Or perhaps he was merely doing so for the sake of her comfort. Whatever the reason, her nerves prickled; intuitively aware of the tension that was her unconscious reaction to the confession. Yet she was not afraid, not as she had ever been before. It was a pleasant anxiety, the kind belonging to prey who _wanted_ to be hunted; an appreciation and a desire for his attention.

"Shamelessly," she informed him, hoping he would understand that it wasn't a rejection, merely returning the teasing banter.

Azrael smiled, soft and relaxed; and just beneath that, somewhere behind everything he consciously showed, there was relief. She hadn't avoided a connection, a definite step forward. Perhaps this forging of a relationship would prove less difficult than he had originally expected.

Pleased, he lifted his glass to take an even larger gulp of the crimson liquid with satisfied relish, aware of Lilith's curious eyes on him.

"What _is_ that?"

He glanced at it, cradled in his hand, looking bemused. "An accidental invention," he said vaguely. "White wine, cherry juice and pulp, whiskey, bourbon, raspberry juice, extract of lotus root and a great deal of nerve…or perhaps stupidity. I called it a Blood Lotus."

Stunned by the impressive list of ingredients involved in the small scarlet drink, she inquired further; "why, because of the color?"

"No," he snorted with suppressed laughter, "because the first one I drank made my nose bleed. But it looks pretty, and the extract has a calming affect when mixed with alcohol. The lotus is also one of my favorite flowers—second only to the lily."

"Lilies are your favorite flowers?" It was impossible to think this anything but incredibly sweet. She hadn't expected him to be interested in things like flowers, though she supposed it made little sense to make any such assumptions about him; he wasn't exactly a normal man, after all. He was entitled to have his own quirks.

"Yes. They smell like you."

The blush at her cheeks was no less than magnificent, a brilliant pink which nearly matched the daiquiri in front of her. Thoroughly thrown, she found herself unable to give him anything beyond a shy, trembling smile before fixing her eyes on the drink to try and distract herself from the unshakable honesty that had colored his reasoning. Once she might have laughed, but that remark had been perfectly serious.

"Well, now—what have we here?"

A silver flash sank into the seat beside her, startling a small squeak out of Lilith. Beelzebub's lean, muscular arm slid around her slight shoulders to give her a light squeeze, his slightly too-sharp teeth bared in a mischievous grin while he winked across the table. "Dragged her kicking and screaming back here, eh? Not the best way to keep a girlfriend, methinks."

Azrael dignified the question with the quirking of a single pale eyebrow. "I did nothing of the sort. She asked to come along, how was I supposed to resist?"

The prince's tawny gold eyes swiveled to fix on Lilith's face, his gaze chillingly serious as the ringed irises burned into her skull with patent scrutiny. "Did she now?" he murmured.

While the hawkish gaze was unnerving, she wasn't about to let the attention intimidate her. She let her chin lift just a little to tell him so.

Suddenly Beelzebub's grin was back, all tension easing and his eyes adopting their former playful twinkle. "Well, second time's the charm!"

She averted her gaze in favor of her glass. Despite the angle of phrase, she knew Beelzebub didn't intend to emphasize another visit to the Hall. Perhaps second _woman _would have been more properly descriptive.

"Oh! That reminds me, how's _Big Brother_ been taking this?"

Lilith glanced at the demon once again, intrigued by the slur of emphasis put into the unfamiliar phrase. It had been almost mocking, just barely skimming across the brink of disrespect before darting back again, and slightly hushed as though to avoid calling some great power down upon their heads. But Beelzebub had eyes only for Azrael just then, and so she followed his gaze in the hope of learning more.

The look on her guardian's face was unnerving. A shadow of dusky anger had etched across every plane of pale skin, a flare of scarlet tinting his rapidly darkening eyes. She stared, suddenly wary while the angel answered, tight-lipped and eerily quiet. "He hasn't."

Beelzebub made a short, terse noise that was half sigh and half snort. Then he shrugged, tawny eyes flickering down to fix to somewhere on the table. "Is that for me?" He snagged the as of yet untouched glass, draining the violent yellow-orange liquid in sizable gulps, as though on the brink of dying of thirst.

"You're terrible," Azrael mused, watching his friend down the alcohol at record speed. The touch of chilling anger seemed to have faded with thanks to what was probably a very intentional effort to lighten the mood. "Drinking so much is bad for you."

The demon prince made a derisive sound at the back of his throat. "As if. It ain't like I'll kill my liver—not in _this_ body." He lifted his arms to strike a dynamic, exaggerated strongman pose, chest puffed out, flexing his biceps proudly; to which Azrael replied by throwing the salt-shaker, hitting him squarely in the ribs just above the diaphragm. Catching it before it fell, the prince let the posture fall with a snicker and set it back down on the surface of the table.

"Come on, angel," he goaded the blank-faced Azrael. "Don't tell me you wouldn't show off for a pretty girl. You're not a bad piece of meat, yourself."

The angel's expression remained almost disdainfully amused. "I have no desire to make a spectacle of myself, especially not if you are involved. And I am not a beef-steak, thank you _very_ much."

"_Jesus,_ hard-ass," Beelzebub whined playfully, "what do I have to do to—" He cut himself off, his sidelong glance in Lilith's direction forged with pure, crafty interest. She stared at him, wary of the mischief in the demon's tawny eyes and wondering whether or not to be concerned.

He grinned at his friend, white teeth flashing in the dim light. "Bet you'd take your shirt off for _her,_" Beelzebub jerked his head in her direction, his disheveled silvery hair flying out with the movement to flop over his face, devilish and sly. "Pants too, I'll reckon."

Lilith's cheeks burned. Her eyes grew wide and determinedly she fixed them to her glass, hands clenched together in her lap to keep them from shaking. She should have been offended. It didn't matter if it was only teasing; she had never tolerated such talk before. But it was as if her heart and body had conspired against her poor, outnumbered brain, flooding her with intrigue and unwanted fascination.

Could she possibly want Beelzebub to be right? He did have a beautiful torso_… _And she refused to carry that thought and further.

"That's _it_!"

Azrael's eyes flickered with fun, his face warming with a challenge that was neither angered nor all that intimidating. His lips curled with a daring smile, his hands gripping the glossy fabric of his coat and yanking it from his body, the soft blue sweatshirt following to leave him in his sleeveless shirt. The light from the neo-Victorian sconces set along the walls played upon his pale skin, highlighting and accenting the graceful, muscular curves of his powerful arms, the white of the cloth lying close to his chest.

He propped an elbow on the table and held out his hand. "Let's go, dragon boy."

Beelzebub flashed another wild grin, leaning forward and gripping the proffered hand while he rolled up the sleeve of his loose black t-shirt so that it followed the joint of his shoulder and exposed the muscle of his upper arm. "Oh, you're _on,_ blondie. Ready…go!"

Fingers tightened; tendon and bone crackling as the two males heeded the signal and pushed.

_Arm wrestling?_

She rolled her eyes and sighed. Boys would be boys, she figured, amused, and she leaned back against her seat in order to better observe the contest of strength, sipping quietly at her drink. From her angle, it seemed that the two of them were fairly evenly matched for neither hand drew any closer to the table. Though the demon was slightly smaller in stature than the angel, they both showed strain; muscles bulging under the pressure they exerted, wrists locked, nails biting into the other's skin, teeth gritted.

Taking the given opportunity, she studied the smooth curves of Azrael's arm and shoulder as white-blond hair slipped from behind his ear to veil his laughing eyes.

He truly was lovely; and not just in figure or his looks, but in the characteristics of gentleness, patience and an eagerness to love. Suddenly she could understand the haunted, despairing look burned into the portrait photograph that hung on Beelzebub's office wall; that grim, resigned, and soulless void within those peaceful violet eyes.

He was not the kind of creature intended to live in solitude. He deserved to be loved and cherished, never to have been abused the way he had been, deserted and abandoned by the woman to whom he would have given the world. How could he have endured it when he was already misunderstood by the mortal people he served, when they saw a ruthless monster when in truth he was so kind? If his attraction was even _near_ the demon prince's description, it was a no wonder he was so avid when it came to keeping her safe.

Did she have any right to fear that? Was it wrong for part of her to want to be the one to love and cherish him?

"Hah!" With a thunderous noise, Azrael slammed the back of Beelzebub's hand against the ebony table, the impact jerking her from her thoughts and leaving her mildly disoriented.

It appeared the angel had won; Beelzebub was rubbing his wrist with a sour expression coloring his foxy face while Azrael smirked at him from across the table. "There are some perks to being old, no?" he remarked airily.

"Yeah, yeah." Beelzebub peered into his empty glass. "Bite me."

"I would really rather not."

A snort of derision. "Buy me another drink, then."

Lilith's laughter burst through the playful argument, incredulous with amusement and joy. "You're both hysterical," she giggled beneath the curious watch of both men. "You fight like an old married couple!"

Beelzebub snickered, adding quickly, "if we're a couple, he's the wife."

Azrael retorted, "I resent that. _You_ lost, didn't you?"

"Because you cheated," was the snippy reply. "For shame! You're supposed to be sinless, you blasphemer—"

"You would know."

"_Not_ cool…"

"Ok, boys," Lilith interjected for the second time, trying to avoid cracking a rib on her laughter as she did, "I hate to interrupt, but could one of you point out the bathroom?"

Beelzebub slid out of his seat to let her up, stabbing a finger toward the door that led to the rave room. "It's through there. Follow the wall to your left and you'll run right into it."

Azrael made as if to stand, clearly intending to accompany her, but Beelzebub gave a short bark of laughter, planted a hand on the angel's shoulder and pushed him right back down. "Chill. She'll be fine on her own without you tailing her," he muttered, "overprotective bird…"

Violet eyes narrowed with a mild glare for the demon, but they softened when they moved to her. "Just keep your eyes open, all right?" His tone was imploring, a gentle request that held just the tiniest trace of pleading underneath. She nodded, turned, and started off for the restrooms with the noise of the prince's playful jeering in her ears.

...

The door to the women's restroom closed behind her with a snap that was rendered inaudible by the pounding tumult of noise sealed into the rave room like water contained beneath a thick sheet of ice. Lights flared through the pitch-worthy blackness and straight into her eyes; bright and disorienting. Heat rose from the mass of swaying bodies cramped together like sardines in a can, rubbing and grinding together in a strange, faux imitation of sensuality.

The scantily clad people, demon and human alike, twined among one another as though they were a single being; all limbs and sensitive skin, grasping kisses scattered among the throbbing thunder of the beat. All of it highlighted in white and scarlet flares. They created living photographs, catching short snatches of time with every flash.

Whirling color and sound hammered at her brain until she could hardly see straight. The thick, musky scent of sweat smeared with a hundred different varieties of perfume and cologne to concoct a sickly-sweet stench that threatened to drown any passerby in an ocean of nausea.

Lilith was feeling both extremely out of place and very much alone in this haven for the depraved, her eyes wide as she tried to locate some semblance of balance. It hadn't been this rowdy when she'd come in. But now she could barely find the inspiration to breathe, not wanting to inhale the dank, garish smog that had replaced it. It made her lungs hurt and her head ache, and she reached for the wall she had used in order to navigate her way to the bathrooms.

It was easier to feel her way. Using her hands to guide her, she avoided being thrown off by the outrageous public shame in her surroundings. It disgusted her to witness these people flaunting. Sex was not something to be treated with so casually or openly, it was a private thing and one that she had no wish to be involved with.

Her hand grazed the bare sheetrock, seeking some semblance of coolness or prudence within the wall, fighting back the desire to sink to her knees and curl up in a ball. She didn't feel safe here, exposed and afraid of these strangers and their imprudence. Repeatedly she asked herself why she had set foot in this horrible place to begin with…but she already knew why.

Because of Azrael she had felt no fear, had felt no need to be watchful or to fall into panic every other minute simply because he'd been near. She had trusted him so _unconsciously._ Why hadn't she felt it before?

The pads of her fingertips smoothed over cloth and her brain jerked at the change just as a strong, wiry hand closed around the small circle of her wrist. Her head snapped around to look and she was unsettled to see her own fingers backed by the coarser cotton cloth of a man's shirt. She blinked dazedly up at the man who had inserted himself directly in her path; the formidable shoulders, masculine jaw, prominent arches of his brow and nose all insignificant.

The thing that caught and held her attention was the eyes of leering crimson set within his face; eyes that managed to be both enticing and soothing while the grip at her arm tightened. Startled as she was, Lilith could do nothing but gape, horrified in her fascination. Though they frightened her, she found that she couldn't – and didn't want to – look away from those eyes.

Pain broached the haze of whatever spell held her. It forced a whimper from her throat, urged her to tug backward in an attempt to free herself. But the sturdy fingers locked against her momentum until she didn't dare pull any more, his grip firm, unshakable, and crushing with its weight.

"Shh."

He hissed the sound intended to calm her, the sound rough and dry, yet somehow as hypnotizing as the tune of a music box that sank inside the head and refused to be shaken loose. It allowed little space in its wake for discomfort, despite that her better sense demanded that she yank her arm away and run as fast as she could.

There was something deceptive about the way he held her focus, a facet of calm that tried to hide the sense of danger that slid beneath his outward geniality. His tall, wiry figure seemed to flicker, as though with a whisper of illusion to convince her that his strength wasn't that much greater than her own, empty of threat. A fact she knew was total and utter crap. But she couldn't seem to find the strength or the will to retreat any further.

"Please." Her voice sounded meek and timid to her own ears, colorless. It was the last resistance she had to the forceful power within the silent compulsion bearing down in her skull, an attempt to break away from whatever control he had. "Let go…"

His lips pulled back in a coy, secretive smile before he answered with a sleek, "no." Then he lowered his head so that his mouth just brushed the soft skin of her thumb joint. "You'll do nicely." She found that his breath was frigid when his thin lips parted, his somehow too thin tongue tracing the blue lines of the veins in her wrist.

There was a still, breathless moment; the kind where nothing seemed to move and the molecules in the room hung suspended like gossamer pinpricks of frost, just before her body rebelled.

She yanked with all her might against the grip around her arm. Her feet scraped against the cement, fortifying her leverage to push backward and her eyes cleared long enough to see passed the morbid beauty in his eyes. Suddenly she saw the slight gauntness to his cheeks, the shadows beneath his eyes, the fiery strands of hair that carved bloody streaks across his face. And in those drawing, alluring eyes, she could read the burn of unshakable hatred.

Her entire being was sickened and offended by his proximity and his touch, disgusted by the sensation of his mouth upon her skin. Indecency wrapped around her like the clutch of dripping fingers. Even his scent was bad. Where was the clean, spicy fragrance she remembered? Where was the warmth she so relished? Why were his eyes so wrong?

A sharp, tearing pain struck her blind when something pierced the flesh just beneath her palm, scalding the flat space at the underside of her fragile wrist. She was _burning._

"Let _go _of me!" The scream was pure, distress-driven reflex. Her voice rose to the level of hysteria, fueled by the twisting desperation for freedom, her eyes closed as she devoted all her meager human strength into breaking his grip.

Everything that occurred after the shout was thrown from her lips was a blur.

Somewhere, back in the farthest corner of her consciousness, she felt a response. A head jerking around, snapping to attention, a table nearly overturned when a body lunged into action. Anger, fear and concern bent together. It flared through her system as the man holding her withdrew in alarm, cursing and hurried.

He thrust her aside where she fell unsteadily to the floor, landing hard on her back, her head cracking against the brick wall. Before the moment passed he had slipped into the crowd, which slowed to a bewildered halt, the music quieting into a gentle murmur of curious voices that rose in its place. They peered around in the dizzying dark to see what had caused the commotion.

Pain arched in the base of her neck when she tried to sit up, bright fireworks in her eyes. It pinched, trauma-wracked nerves striking her temples with heat and clouded the back of her vision with darkness.

Yet as close as she realized she was to blacking out, she was conscious enough to feel the crowd edging its way toward her. Several braver, more curious individuals maneuvered nearer in order to examine the curious, fallen girl at the base of the wall. Strange, unreal people she didn't want near her.

"Out of my way—!"

The shout was distant and low, muted as though from very far away. But she knew that voice; knew its gentle, bell-like ring and almost musical clarity. It called for her attention – _demanded_ it – compelled her to respond. She tried to open her eyes and failed. The lids were heavy with shock and pain that flashed across her head and hand.

Then, pierced with a rage more terrible than she had ever heard in it before, the voice came again.

"_Get away from her!_"

The cringe caused her aching neck to throb, and she tried not to move again, but there was only so much she could contain when the trembling intensified to a near-convulsive shiver. Foreboding curdled in the pit of her stomach like sour milk.

While the tiny hairs at the base of her neck stood on end, it was with a warm, thrilling kind of terror to replace the chilling, cold one that had been the stranger with the lurid eyes. _This_ voice belonged to no stranger, not anymore, and his anger was a savior sent to free her from shame and exposure.

The curious onlookers retreated immediately, their haste audible in the scuffing, noises made by flat shoes and spike heels as they lurched away like a herd of skittish sheep. And, really, who _wouldn't_ run from that tone? They fled from a raging god, a tempest for his roused temper; a mild, thoughtful exterior given way to the whirling fury of several hurricanes. They dared not defy him. Curiosity wouldn't save them from being torn apart for doing so.

A shadow descended upon her, blocking her fallen figure from the blaze of the lights. Azrael's hands were cool and gentle when he knelt beside her, feathering across her brow and temples to draw the hurt away. "Lilith," his voice was urgent, tight and quick with reigned-in anger that he suppressed from being mirrored in the careful examination. "Lilith, can you hear me?"

"Speak more softly," she begged, wincing at the pounding in her head, "that _hurts._"

His relief for her consciousness was pronounced, but he was still worried for her health. Afraid she had injured something vital, the protective fear colored the air around him. Yet even at such an inappropriate time she couldn't help but notice that the smooth smell of his skin was nothing short of wonderful. _That_ was the scent she remembered. The _right_ one.

"What happened?" he pressed, concern a fluid sharpness in his voice.

"I don't…" Her eyes fluttered and finally opened to gaze up at her guardian's shadowed face. His pale hair was loose and wild with, clothing mussed by his forceful venture through the crowd to get to her. Beelzebub there too, she saw, his stony presence serving as an assurance toward their privacy, his tawny-eyed glare warding the curious onlookers away from the scene and back to their amusement elsewhere.

_Nothing to see here,_ his posture read. _Move on._

"Lilith?"

She glanced back to Azrael, voiceless and dazed. His hands carefully gripped her shoulders, his body hunched protectively over her as though to shield her from the eyes still straying their way.

"Try to focus. I need you to tell me what—" And suddenly he went still, his entire, powerful form frozen and tense as a spring wound as tightly as it would go, his nostrils flared. "Blood," he whispered, and she could hear the horror inside it.

He snatched at her chin, tipping it upward so he could examine her throat; gently and with care, but desperate. Finding nothing, he frowned, skimming her shoulders and arms in search of something she couldn't hope to guess. Finally he gripped her hands, forcing the leaden limbs to a position where he could clearly see them. Then he turned them over, and a low, venomous hiss slid from between his clenched teeth.

"_Shit!_"

Beelzebub crouched beside them, golden eyes serious when he questioned, "what is it?"

Azrael dropped the unmarked hand, gripping the fabric of Lilith's soft white sweater and pushing it back to expose the lower half of her arm. The tips of his fingers brushed the two raw, reddened punctures that marred the skin of her wrist like the bite of a snake's fangs, garish and pronounced.

The demon paled, his cheeks stripped of alcohol-induced flush in a brief second. "It's not—?"

"No, thank God Almighty. No poison, but…" Azrael hesitated. Lifting the injured hand to his nose he sniffed delicately, and then more deeply, as though trying to pull something out of the blood that oozed from the tiny holes in her skin. A sheen of steel shivered across his grip as it tightened about her arm. "Can you smell that?"

Beelzebub took an inspective inhale. "You don't think—"

"What else do you know that leaves a mark like this?" Azrael spat, his dark eyes snapping with a fury that made Lilith's eyes wide with apprehension and fear. Why was he so angry all of a sudden? What had she missed?

Beelzebub's tone was calmer, collected. "Be reasonable," he murmured, "Asmodeus still has time on his probation. He can't have—"

"What are a few months of four thousand years?" the angel growled, his face hard with anger and his voice like a barbs of frost. "You know as well as I do these things aren't monitored near well enough…"

Through the throbbing in her temples, she recognized the flare of his temper. She read the tremble of rage exuding from the usually cool-headed, sweet-tongued man due to the fact that she had been threatened. It was just like Kevin; a flare of terrible desire to punish the one who had meant to injure her, all strength and gleaming energy and firm, beautiful power as he turned to lash back on her behalf – every inch an avenging angel.

The grip at her arms did not hurt; it was only concern. Even if the majority of her injuries were of her own doing, even if they were minor or easily healed, because she had been threatened, his guarding instincts had leapt to life. She realized now that he couldn't help it. This possessive need to keep her safe…it wasn't so scary anymore.

"Calm down." Beelzebub's hand settled upon Azrael's tense shoulder, grasping tight with the apparent intent to hold the other man back. From doing _what,_ she didn't know. "You have no proof he was even in the realm, let alone here. Cool your pretty blond head and think for a minute, would you?"

But it was clear Azrael had no desire to merely think things over. His eyes were darker than she'd ever seen them – deadly, even. His posture had a wound, coiled look, as though prepared to spring at an oppressor, the tendons in his arms and hands strained against his skin, his jaw clenched. The almost irrational pitch of his anger had seemed to unhinge his rationality from its shelves, and Beelzebub had to work hard to drag the angel away from it.

With a rough shake to the other man's shoulder to gain his attention, Beelzebub hissed a reprimand between his teeth. "_Think, Azrael!"_

Lilith noticed the change, the accent and emphasis of the sounds lending the name a deadly purpose. A name of power: doorway to ancient and artful magics. It drove a shiver down her back, triggering the spark of instinctual fear she tended to reserve for her moments of paranoia.

Something shifted beneath the charred, murderous violet of Azrael's eyes; something touched by the usage of his name. Something behind his countenance turned its face to the fool who dared invoke its presence. It was raw and almost animal, an uncut gem overflowing with a dark, gleaming brilliance that was as beautiful as it was terrifying.

Now she could see the connection with the mortal legends of a cold, cruel figurehead of death, devoid of mercy, devoid of peace. A god of unthinkable knowledge and unparalleled strength. It was a side to her guardian she had never expected to cross paths with. She hadn't realized such a side of him existed.

"Even if it _was_ him, not even Minos would back you on proof of scent alone." Beelzebub threw a glance over his shoulder, eyeing the huge iron-detailed clock set into one of the walls. "Look, I'll do some poking around, ask some questions and try to find out if there were any under-the-table transports set up tonight—see if I can pin him to it. Right now, you just worry about making sure her head's not screwed up, ok?"

Azrael didn't respond, and the demon's blank expression hardened into a surprisingly fierce glare. "Do I need to make that an order?"

For a split, awful second, it looked as though the angel might actually strike the demon prince. But in another instant, the sliver of violence was gone, as was the shadowed otherness behind Azrael's rapidly calming face as he relieved himself of tension with a single whisper of breath. "No," he murmured, tone weary, "no, I understand."

A grateful look met one of equal relief, an exchange of fine-tuned knowledge from one man to the other. The demon nodded once, rose and turned to go; off to run the errands he had promised.

"Wait, I have a note for you." The angel dug into the pocket of his jeans, groping for the scrap of paper tucked there for safe-keeping. Beelzebub caught the folded missive as it dropped from Azrael's fingers.

"Who from?"

"Balberith. Something about your father's request for the Iscariot records."

The demon rolled his eyes, his expression miffed, and stuffed the note into his own pocket without bothering to examine its contents. "_Wonderful_, more good news. Well, ta' for now." With a flash of silver hair and a dismissive swish of synthetic fabric, he had gone, vanishing into the crowd that had resumed its activity with only a slightly more subdued edge.

Azrael allowed himself a soft, weary sigh as he angled back toward a politely puzzled Lilith. His eyes were whitened with strain and his jaw still seemed tense, but otherwise he appeared to be his normal self. She was looking at him curiously, questions burning behind her unusually pale face. "Who—?"

"No one important," he said airily, deflecting her effort to inquire as to the identity of the man he had discussed with Beelzebub – the man who had attacked her.

But he was not being completely honest with her and somehow she could feel it. She wasn't sure why or how she could sense the guarded edge to his outward mood, she knew he had erected shields between them, held by cautious mental hands and purposefully designed to keep something safe. While there was probably a very good reason for this distance, knowing this didn't stem her curiosity. Nor did it ease any of her anxiety.

On the other hand, if he intended to turn this relationship they had into something tangible and real, there needed to be some semblance of trust between them. Without trust, they would have nothing.

Ignoring the way it trembled, she lifted a hand, letting the tips of her fingers gently graze the prominent arch of his cheekbone. Her voice was barely more than the softest whisper, a wisp of cloud in a warm, morning sky when she spoke. "Why are you hiding from me?"

The innermost rings of his irises darkened, guarded pallor shifting smoothly into an apologetic violet as he took her shaky hand between both of his own; softly stroking the back of it as though to make his apology sink through her skin. "Forgive me, I don't mean to worry you. But I can't tell you much."

And just like that the shields went up, drawn back to allow her sight of what lay beneath the human shell he wore. His tension eased, taking her anxious thoughts with it. But he looked just as grave as he had before, unspeakable anger replaced by a protective prudence that spoke of a fear that she didn't understand.

"Humanity gives the angelic race far too much credit." He met her eyes. "They gift us with strength ordained by goodness and unmatched power from God's favor, but nothing is so simple as the difference between right and wrong. Good doesn't always have more power than evil, and our system is not as perfect as it is assumed to be."

She listened patiently, watching the haze of remembrance unwittingly smooth over his handsome face like a paper-thin veil of glass. Memory was drawn into the pools of his eyes, reflected in the surfaces of his skin until it put a quiet glow in the air around him, but she couldn't interpret it clearly enough to make any sense of the shadows. So she listened, settling for what he chose to give her instead of making her brain ache through hypothetical assumption.

"It is true that the devil was thrown from the heavens by an angel and not by God, but all creatures suffer weak moments and that was one of his. The king of Hell is stronger than any of the seraphim, yet it is said that any one of us is his match because we side with God. This is not true, and as much difficulty as it makes for everyone involved, the matters of politics between the immortal realms are just as complicated and delicate as they are here."

His sigh was soft as a new feather. "We can't make a move without good, solid reason, and we can't seek conflict because of the risk of starting another war." When he looked at her again, it was with clear eyes again. "I'm sorry for the sermon. I tell you this to emphasize that I keep information from you not because I wish to, but to keep you safe."

"From what?" she asked, genuinely curious.

His smile was affectionate, but quickly gone as he glanced over his shoulder, suddenly watchful. "We should continue this discussion in a more secure setting. I'll take you home first." A gentle touch to her forehead drew her attention back to how very cool his skin felt while he examined her face and inquired; "Do you feel any pain?"

Lilith tested her neck by moving it slowly side to side. It didn't hurt like she had expected it to, but her temples pounded with the effects of an oncoming migraine. So she nodded, very slowly. "My head hurts."

The murderous gleam slid a tint of steel back across his irises, yet he remained gentle and soft-spoken, avoiding whatever furies her pain inspired. "All right. I can't physically move you until I can look over your bones, so I'll need to transport you my way. This may be uncomfortable," he added, "and you should close your eyes…"

She did as he suggested. Blindly she could feel his palm find her shoulder and the fingers of his other hand curl securely about her forearm, the grip warm with a kind of protective reassurance that set her heart to fluttering.

At first there was nothing, and after a few seconds of this nothing she began to wonder if he had been teasing her for some odd reason. Just as she was about to open her eyes she felt a strange sensation rather like that of tugging around the area of her naval; yet the feeling was inside her, as though a fishhook had somehow been inserted into her abdomen and was pulling her backward. Frankly, it was both uncomfortable and halfway to frightening.

The tiniest spark of fear at the back of her mind, she swallowed, squeezing her eyes even more tightly shut and groping for Azrael. The flesh of his arm was warm and sturdy, and she clutched at him. She clung as though fearing letting go would cause her to lose her anchor to reality and fly off into some strange netherworld.

From where it rested upon her shoulder, his hand gripped more firmly, guiding her from the brink of panic.

And as suddenly as it had been there it was gone; fishhook pinch and all. Her body settled, sinking into a cushion which warmly compressed to prop her thighs and support her back, seemingly out of nowhere.

"You should be able to look now," he told her quietly.

Cautiously she opened her eyes to peer incredulously around at the living room of her apartment, awe swelling in the place of dizziness and apprehension. One minute she had been sitting on the floor of a night club, the next she was back home on her couch. _What_ in the name of everything _holy_ had just happened?

"I don't believe it," she breathed, pressing a hand to her temple to steady the sway and dip of the room around her. "What did you _do?_"

Azrael's laughter was vibrant and lively, but hushed to avoid aggravating her headache. "Of all things to not believe," he teased, "you can accept that I'm an angel within a space of mere days, accept that my closest friend is a demon and accept that immortals are all around you without a single real problem. But I transport you and suddenly you can't believe?"

"All right, all right!" She pouted as he threw back his head and laughed some more, finding the flood of amusement unnecessary. "I was serious, you know."

"Yes, I know," he replied upon regaining some sense of control. "I'm sorry, but it really _was_ funny. Simply put, I realigned the consistency and energetic charge of the air around us and had it adjust the placement of our physical bodies."

She gave him a perfectly blank stare, clearly not having followed a word that had just come out of his mouth, and he smiled at her.

"No matter, just think of it as being telekinetic—movement with the mind, but in an extremely accelerated fashion."

Almost absently Lilith shook her head as she studied him, the dark hair escaping from her bun whisked over her shoulders as she did so. "I don't think I'll _ever_ understand you completely."

He gave her a thoughtful, almost pensive look. "Perhaps I'm not as complicated as you think I am."

Something within those words struck a chord in her memory but she couldn't for the life of her recall why, for she had never heard them before. He didn't add anything else, nor did he stop to allow her time to consider the unspoken promise of time that lay behind it. Instead, he knelt upon the floor beside the couch and patted the plush cushion. "All right, lie here and I'll take a look at your back."

She did as he asked, shifting very slowly and cautiously to lay face-down across the length of the couch, head propped on a folded blanket pulled from the padded arm. The motion only hurt a small bit. Her temples throbbed briefly with the change in height, but once she was settled and comfortable the pain was hardly recognizable.

When he lifted the hem of her sweater, she had to work to prevent herself from startling. But he merely pushed the light fabric upward, folding it neatly, to bare the expanse of her back. The air was cool on her skin, a stark contrast to the warm hand that braced against the very center of the bared flesh. The pads of his fingers grazed the lines of her ribs, tracing the curve of her spine and following the trail from the very base of her neck all the way down to the belt-loop of her jeans.

It was far from unpleasant, and perhaps that was the problem. Because the jolt of her heart, the frenzied pace, irregular quick, was very nearly disturbing. She had accepted that she was attracted to him (and after all, who _wouldn't_ be?) which was fine and dandy in itself, but there was the simple issue of her outlook on romantic relationships.

He made her nervous; not in a bad way, or she didn't _think_ it was bad. Yet it was enough to make her regard her automatic reaction to his touch with a rather stern disapproval.

She felt vulnerable and exposed by the lack of a protective layer of cloth between her skin and his, especially when the touch of his fingertips brushed the clasp of her bra on their way down. And while she insisted it should have been, the light tingle of enthralling anticipation wasn't easy to quell.

Heat spilled into her. It was as though he had dipped his hand through her skin and sinew to grip her bones and infuse them with the warmth of a white-hot coal, and she shivered under the sensation of his magic inside her body. She actually had to clench her teeth to keep from shrieking. Power twined about her spine like the sinuous body of a serpent, like a sweet sort of toxin, stilling everything around her with a trembling, suffocating silence.

And then he withdrew, smoothing the hem of her shirt back down; the contact very deliberately brief, which made her wonder if she hadn't merely imagined the soft fan of his breath at the tender space at the nape of her neck.

"You should be fine now," he told her coolly. "I mended the pinched nerves and relaxed the muscles."

Lilith sat up, determinedly not looking at his face while shifting to settle with her legs curled around her rear, feeling blatant alarm meet the warmth in her face and neck. The utter intimacy of letting him reach inside her like that hadn't escaped her but – God help her – she had _liked_ it. Something about that was both terrifying and freeing.

He was avoiding her gaze as well, as she noticed when she braved a hesitant glance his way. There was a hint of well-disguised shame lurking beneath his pursed lips; a distinct darkness there that she couldn't quite read. Nevertheless, he was steady when he took her hand and turned it so that the punctured wrist faced the ceiling, smeared red with dried blood. Wordlessly he lifted it to his mouth, lips parting so his breath would brush the two tiny wounds.

She stared with a little less amazement than she might have had a week ago and more unabashed curiosity to watch the cuts smooth away. They actually closed in upon themselves until the breaks were completely mended. Only the blood remained; a lingering reminder that there had once been any injury at all.

"How are you doing this?" she asked, "I thought Raphael was the healer."

His eyes rose to meet hers in a soft clash of violet and green, gazing up at her from his crouch on the floor, both contemplative and conflicted. She suddenly hoped that she hadn't sounded completely naïve.

"He is," Azrael answered softly, voice barely louder than the whisper of leaves in a gentle breeze.

"But then how—"

"I'm a mage," he interrupted gently, "I can use my magic to do many things. I can't stop internal bleeding or mend a broken mind, but I can handle little things, minor hurts. And Raphael can't remove poison or a curse."

Alarm seizing her by the shorthairs she cast a fearful glance at her wrist and the dots of blood. "Was I cursed?"

"No, no," he was quick to reassure by squeezing her fingers. "There was nothing but the cuts."

"Oh…"

The moment that passed was awkward and full of heavy silence. Then, out of what felt like nowhere, Azrael murmured bleakly, "I owe you an apology." He released her hand, letting it slip through his fingers, and leaving her feeling strangely hurt and heartily confused.

For a split second too long her hand hovered in midair, as though the appendage itself was lost and forlorn to be so painfully rejected. Lilith hid the slip by tucking a stubborn piece of hair behind her ear. She didn't bother to avoid watching him, nor her concern. "What for?" she inquired with a feigned lightness, not liking the strange reserve that dulled his lovely face.

He seemed taken aback, as though she was supposed to know the reasons he was expressing regret. "For allowing harm to come to you, of course," he answered. "Had I been minding my surroundings, I would have _known_ you were in danger. But I was not," this last bit was uttered with a distressing sharpness, "and you got hurt. Something I swore would never happen under my watch."

"I don't blame—" She began, but he cut her off with a little less grace than she would have expected.

"The question you asked me before. I didn't answer it because I fear doing so might put you in danger." A sigh breached the stillness of his face and eased some of the harshness there. "I don't pretend to possess such great influence or power, but I do have enemies—some of them quite dangerous. And it would seem that someone has already tried to injure you, though for what purpose I don't yet know. As your guardian I'm meant to keep you safe, and just now this means keeping certain things from your ears. Can you understand that?"

How a man could implore so thoroughly with such saddened eyes she couldn't have said. Torn between worry that she would demand answers anyway and a clear, echoing wish that he could offer them, his eyes had a haunted look. A look that belonged on a face much older than the one he possessed.

"I could never forgive myself if something happened to you because my tongue was loose."

After what had just happened in the Hall, she didn't doubt it for one minute. She wouldn't have been a real library employee if she didn't believe that knowledge was, indeed, power, and his explanation made enough sense to placate her questions. It didn't lessen the leftover quivering of her insides, but then again she couldn't be certain the encounter with the strange man in the rave room was entirely to blame for that.

Besides, she trusted Azrael to keep her safe, which was something he had ultimately done despite the cuts to her wrist. They had been minor injuries versus what could have happened. He was her guardian, like he'd said. And that, she knew now, counted for something.

"I understand," she assured him meekly. "I don't blame you either—for…it wasn't your fault he…" After a floundering attempt to find a description, she eventually decided to simply let the matter rest. Flustered and embarrassed, she bit her lip.

All of a sudden she was met with a wall of utter relief. She squeaked in surprise when his powerful arms slid around her waist to pull her into a warm embrace, the angel's hands against her upper back and his face tucked into the curve of her neck. The flow of emotion she felt from his was quiescent and peaceful.

_She_ was not so calm. She thought her heart might leap right out of her chest, thrilled by such nearness. While she was able to find enough tranquility to relax into the cradling touch, she couldn't help the unsettled squirms of delight sparkling in her belly when her hands brushed the gentle slope of his sides.

"_Khai'ruhn dei,_" he whispered; pure gratitude and compassion.

She had no idea what they meant, but felt such a wave of serenity from the foreign words that it almost didn't matter. They seemed to drip from his tongue like warm honey. It was a lovely sound, half whisper and half song, and almost sensual; for something in the words made her skin prickle with warmth that was both abruptly affectionate and intrigued.

"What language are you speaking?" The question was tentative, all too aware of her ignorance. Yet despite her eagerness for an answer, she almost hoped he would ignore the inquiry and settle for kissing her instead.

Where on earth had _that_ come from?

Azrael rose to his feet (and, Lilith noted, quite respectable height) to join her on the couch. She had just begun to mourn the loss of the arms around her, but after hardly a beat they were sliding back into place, apparently unable to stand be without contact any longer than he absolutely had to. "It's one of the tongues that has no name—the language of the heavens."

She frowned and wondered aloud: "It's weird how everyone would assume Latin…"

When she didn't add anything more, he mused; "Latin is an old language, true, but it was conceived by humans, used to create the Bible."

She peered up at him, fascinated by the prospect of gleaning some new tidbits of fact and history.

"Heaven's words were lost to your kind when Jophiel—the Guardian of Eden at the time—drove Adam and Eve from paradise and bound what power they had. They were forbidden ever to utter our words again; so the priests had to create something with which to speak and write the words they believed to be God's. There are some lingering similarities, but it isn't the holy tongue." Suddenly he was smiling fondly down at her. "I said _thank you._"

The smile that matched his was a shy one under the piercing touch of his gaze. She chose not to comment on the expression of thanks, no doubt for the forgiveness she didn't feel was necessary. "I have one more question."

"Shoot."

"Why would you arm wrestle to settle an argument?"

He grinned, white teeth flashing in the soft light from the lamp situated on the table across from them. "It seemed appropriate. Easy, uncomplicated, and fairly amusing."

She rolled her eyes. "Male logic, is that it?"

"Exactly."

"Whatever you say," she patted his arm in a manner that was amusedly tolerant.

While all she really wanted to do was relax, she didn't want him to go just yet; and as if her mouth was secretly plotting something devious without the rest of her brain knowing, she found herself asking him whether he wanted to watch a movie with her.

His answering squeeze to her middle was warm and somehow tender. "For you, darling, anything."

She fumbled for the remote, her reach somewhat limited by his silent refusal to release her, and letting her dark brown hair tumble over her shoulder to conceal the smile that graced her lips; telling herself that it was ok to be pleased by the endearing reply, and that no, she wasn't going crazy. Although, who really wanted to be normal?

Or lonely?


	18. The Guardian

**Chapter 21  
**The Guardian

Recommended Listening: "Here With Me" by Dido and "Frozen" by Madonna

* * *

There was something entrancing about the way he moved; something so sleekly graceful, an impossible melding of a wolf's padding grace and the soaring ease of some slender bird. He moved as though he was walking on water, lightly and with a well-balanced dignity. Even the brief, simple task of crossing the tiny living room in order to flip off the television held the beauteous simplicity of a dance.

She watched as he walked, long fingers extended to touch the power button at the bottom edge of the screen and sending the contraption to sleep until the next time its services were required. He made the gesture something magical.

Her eyes enjoyed tracing the sturdy curvature of his arms and back when he stretched in lazy luxury. A faint glimpse of the tattoo scrolling across his shoulder blades was offered by the translucent white of his shirt, dark wings etched into the ivory of his pearlescent skin. Though her sight was slightly blurred by weariness, her exhausted brain could still register the thumping flurry of her heartbeat beneath her breast. He was just that beautiful.

She wouldn't have expected one of the oldest of God's children to be even remotely interested in_iThe__Sound__of__Music_,/i but apparently she'd been mistaken. Azrael had remained steadfast by her side during the entire span of the film, watching the recordings of Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer with genial attention and a supportive, reassuring arm around her shoulders until it was over.

Still suffering the minor repercussions of a headache from her fall, she appreciated his strong, protective presence, grateful for the company. It made her feel a little less likely to fall apart…not that that made any sense.

_One of the oldest children of God…_

"How old are you, anyway?"

The instant the question burst from her mouth, she realized just how rude it had probably been. She may have wanted to know, but no one mentioned age in polite conversation because it caused people to become uncomfortable and lie. "Oh—never mind. I'm sorry."

He turned to look at her, his expression mildly quizzical and soft with gentle laughter. "You have such a fear of insulting me!"

The teasing made her smile. She noted that liked his sense of humor; he never made her feel foolish or inferior, and the sound of his laughter was like music.

"Nothing you can say will ever offend me, and you are more than entitled to your questions." He shrugged. "The subject of age means very little to me."

The leisurely steps he took toward the couch were inhumanly smooth, poised to a harmonious perfection. Every movement was subtly sensual. Merely collapsing onto the cushions to land in a pleasantly disheveled heap, settled in the corner between upholstery and throw pillow with his bangs flopping over his face was an act of breathtaking elegance. Not even the thoughtful haze to his eyes was enough to detract from it.

He raked a slender white hand through his hair as he murmured; "I'm older than the pyramids, older than the oldest language of man and the first humans of Eden. Older than recorded time." The smile he gave her was coy, but lined with a sincere apology. "I'm not sure I know, to be honest. Time wasn't always counted, not like it is now. Because my existence was made to be eternal—and because I never felt a need to—I never bothered to keep track."

"That's all right," she reassured him with a dismissive shrug. "It doesn't really matter anyway, does it? You don't look a day over twenty-three." Which was true. Who cared how old he was when, in retrospect, it was an unimportant factor in the overall scheme of things. _She _certainly didn't.

"Something over which I have absolutely no control," he sent her a glance touched with what might have been embarrassment in anyone less beautiful. "We were made to be perpetually young of face."

Lilith couldn't swallow the laughter that slid from her throat, and she teased, "a gift from God, no doubt? A physical connection to heaven?"

Despite the lack of serious injury to his ward, he had not been able to shake the feeling that something ominous lurked beneath the surface of the night. Something wasn't right. But her joy made it difficult to focus on the dark shadow attempting to penetrate his mood, and he graciously decided he would think about the goings-on in the Hall another time.

Her laughter lifted his soul, eased his spirit and calmed the remaining anxiety that lingered there. It was impossible to ignore.

He grinned, eyes sparkling with fun while answering mildly, "let us simply say that the Almighty is something of a romantic. She has a love of beauty and she has a vast perception of it. Thus, her children were the canvases upon which to paint the art she wished to create." Taking a glance down at himself, he gave a good-natured sigh. "I think she was going through an experimental, bleached phase with me. My twin got the lion's share of the color."

She gaped at him, caught by the sharp stab of surprise. "What do you mean, twin? You have a _twin?__"_

Good Lord, i_two/i_ of him running around? They would have to be locked up or outlawed, because the female race wouldn't stand a chance.

"In a manner of speaking," he shrugged. "The only thing that really makes us such is that we were created roughly within the same hour. We look and act little alike. I am slightly older, but she is much more cheerful than I—"

Lilith interrupted before she could stop herself. "She?"

A single eyebrow lifted to regard her statement of surprise. "Yes; Enoch. The Left Hand of God, otherwise known as the Metatron."

"The _Metatron,__" _she repeated, trying to gather all she knew about the name. She didn't know much, but what she remembered had a solely male overtone. "The Metatron is a _woman?__"_

His lips lifted with a quiet smile, vaguely and politely amused. "When she chooses to be. Most often she is the only female among five males; the rest of the seraphim tend to lean toward the masculine side, though Gabriel is often torn between the two."

"And you're usually a man?"

The look she was giving him was almost appraising, as though she were recalling the photograph of his female form on Beelzebub's wall and comparing it to how he looked now. He knew she preferred the masculine form, but had Lilith been attracted to her own gender, he would have happily forced himself to comfort in a woman's likeness for her, despite his own preferences. Thankfully that wasn't an issue.

"Ninety-nine percent of the time," he concurred. "As I told you before, it makes me feel more secure."

"Any particular reason for that?" she inquired, a slight touch of innocent humor flaring beneath the mild question.

A crooked smile was shot her way, the almost sly tilt to the curve of his mouth purely ironic. The shade of his eyes lightened, flushing the lavender with the pale blue of a summer sky; the color of affectionate amusement.

This she watched with interest, observing the languid shift of color that seemed to progress along with his moods and realized that she'd begun to notice a pattern with this curious trait. More pleasant emotions appeared along with shades of blue, pale with lighter feelings and dark with the heavier ones. The not-so-nice ones seemed to range on the brink of burgundy, sadness was grayed, surprise was magenta, and gaiety…this shade.

"A fair few reasons," he mused, "Mainly because it feels more natural. But also because as a man I've found it easier to go about my business without hindrance; at least in this form I can pose a more intimidating figure and avoid most unwanted attention." He rolled his eyes. "Honestly, I don't know how the female race can stand all the obnoxious courting rituals human males adore so much."

Lilith snorted quietly, hooking her elbow over the back of the sofa as she leaned back into its padded, cream-striped upholstery. "I take it you don't approve of the flowers, candy and such, then?"

"That's not it," his correction was accompanied by a single shake of his head. "But I don't care for the childish view so many mortals have in regards to something that once demanded elegance. Courting is an _art,_ not a hobby to take up to challenge boredom. It requires patience, devotion, and great diligence."

She listened intently, intrigued by his philosophies. So he found modern dating law to be amusing, but he didn't like the casual nature of it? At first it seemed so old fashioned and stuffy, but as she considered, she realized that she actually found it rather refreshing.

She knew most men were probably relieved not having to live up to the old standards; not having to bow and scrape and kiss hands, write embarrassing letters, hold open doors, pull out chairs, and the like. It wasn't necessary for social acceptance anymore. Nowadays a man could view dating as casually as he wanted to. Even adultery was often forgiven, presented with a brief taste of hell by way of a slap, a lecture, and a few tears before the offender was sent on their way to do it all over again.

Yet he advocated for a completely different culture of ideals; as though a man and a woman shouldn't have dared approach one another without humility and proper dignity and respect. Old world it may have been, but lovely it was also.

"There's no honor or purpose in what your kind calls _dating,__"_ he continued dryly. "It's all a superficial mockery of what courtship is supposed to be, driven by admiration for the faceless masks worn by deceivers and pretenders."

His expression took on a slightly disapproving edge, like that of a parent who doesn't agree with a child's actions, his voice slightly harsh with inflection and feeling. Lilith listened without a word, stricken by the way she sat enraptured by sentiments that should have seemed strange coming from the tongue of a man; and yet sounded so very wonderful.

"It gives the rest of us a negative façade—those of us that wish to do right by ourselves and those we want to love. Humanity has shifted from a time where it was considered popular to have good intentions to an age where it is commonly accepted to be a philanderer…and I have never been able to accept that."

Her lips parted as if for words, but she thought better of it. That was when he smiled, a little sheepish for his fervor, and gestured for her to speak.

Suddenly overtaken by shyness under such brilliant attention, her eyes lowered to study the patterned weave of the pillow perched idly atop her legs. "I was just going to ask what you what you mean by the word _courting,__"_ she mumbled. "I'm not sure I'm familiar with the way you're using it."

He had made it sound as respectable and important as marriage – not that marriage was so honored anymore either, but more like the ideal of marriage. She wasn't sure dating could be deserving of such reverence.

There was a stretch of silence; a lengthy expanse of soundless time that made Lilith's insides squirm with apprehension, wondering if she had finally succeeded in offending him. But he seemed only to be considering her question, for the shade of his presence had neither shifted nor grown tense; merely paused while he thought it through.

"Courtship is the dance enabling life to continue. Within the barest descriptions, it is the means by which a creature ensures the survival of its kind—"

"No, that's _sex,_" she interrupted, her tone hard, dull, laced with distaste and edged in mild annoyance. He shouldn't speak so poetically about something crude and revolting.

The violet of his eyes flickered with a sharp spark of light, a reaction that very strongly disagreed with what she had just been thinking – though how he could have known to such specific a degree, she might never know.

"In a manner of speaking," he admitted quietly, "but there is no procreation without it, and there is no intercourse without courtship."

Her expression warned him of her argument before she could voice it, and he quickly countered: "There are many different methods to courting, some simple as necessity and some very intricate and prolonged, belonging to the more advanced, sophisticated creature. Either way it's the process by which one gender earns the respect and affection of the other so that life may continue."

But Lilith refused to be corrected. "Why are you defending it?" she accused, her insides prickling with annoyance. "Lust is a sin, isn't right? So why do you talk about it like it's something to be revered?"

She stared him right in the eyes, determined to assert herself and not knowing why it seemed so important that she do so. But the mistake was one she hadn't considered until it had already been made and the color of his eyes smoothed into a deep violet that sparkled with lapis lazuli. They were boring straight back into hers.

"There is no sin in truth," he stated calmly, voice cool and light with certainty. "Lust for the flesh is a crucial component to procreation, which was how God meant it to be—reliance on the species itself to continue on a genetic trail. Without it the species would not continue. What's sinful about fulfilling the basest purposes of your existence?"

She made as though to speak, but he lifted a hand to stop her. "Before you take my head off, allow me to speak as one who has had a similar conversation with the Creator…with myself in your shoes."

That gave her pause, simply for the fact that the idea of him voicing the same arguments she had was just…weird. He just seemed so self-assured and put together, it was difficult to imagine him any other way.

"Lust without the presence of any feeling," he said, "without any affection for the other person taking part—_does_ count as a sin; it's a facet of greed or gluttony depending on how one chooses to look at it. But there is hardly ever romantic love when there is an absence of lust. That piece of physical desire is what separates friendship from attraction. It's no sin. It's simply another point of the human psyche, and a complex one."

She made a face. "But it's disgusting—"

"How?" He cut her off mid-sentence, but the inquiry was completely devoid of any impatience, merely diverting the trail of anger before it could ignite, choosing instead to engage her debate rather than ending or overpowering it. "How is it disgusting? What is it about procreation that you find so revolting, Lilith?"

Almost instantly she was on the defensive, sent headfirst into a mood that was purely sullen. "You tell me," she grumbled, crossing her arms over her chest and deliberately diverting her gaze. "You know everything i_else/i_ about me…"

The twist of mild amusement mingled with hurt that crossed his face was an interesting one, but his voice was steady, carefully devoid of emotion as he corrected, "I cannot. I don't have the ability to read your mind or your heart. I can only ask and hope you answer me honestly."

She glanced at him, watching the movement of his perfect mouth while he spoke to her, the knot of conflict stuck in her chest squeezing more and more tightly with every word he uttered. She wanted both to slap him silly and bury her face in his shoulder, and she was furious that she couldn't make up her own mind. Frustration was like an acid bubbling inside her veins. In another moment she would probably start screaming like a lunatic.

And then he was speaking again, softly and almost childishly curious, the question a drop of warm rain. "Why do you fear this kind of love?"

"I'm not afraid of…" Her voice died in her throat, silence by her own realization. _Oh __God,_ he couldn't be right, could he? Not _again._

"Yes, you are." He was so gentle, his voice so quiet and calming, as much of a reassurance as it was an accusation. There was no scorn there, no laughter, no aggravation; simply the yearning to help her. "You fear a touch, a kiss, any promise of desire; but can you tell me why?"

She couldn't find an answer to that question. Though her brain raked through all the information she had stored away, straining and grappling for the means to organize a logical and feasible explanation for why she was so horrified by the idea of consummation. Nothing would come. No matter how many times she tried to shove the reason out, to deny him another victory, it simply wouldn't form.

"I..." She nearly choked on the attempt. "It's just that I…everything I've ever known—"

"You can't, can you?" he murmured, empathy and understanding cushioning the sharp, bladed edge of truth that followed it.

She couldn't believe she was letting him do this to her. The entirety of her belief system was being questioned, put on trial by an ideal that could have been believable, that she almost wished she could trust. How he could be so stubborn when _she_ was right?

"Your views have developed in time with your growth," he told her patiently, the song of his voice calling her from her frustration and confusion. "The fear you hold for the male race—as initiated by your father—has led you to believe that all men are abusive in all things."

Briefly he was quiet, stilled by a distinct thoughtfulness that leant his eyes a paled blue sheen that was altogether quite lovely. "The shift to fear of sexual contact is not an entirely unusual result. Your adult schema has simply translated it as a dislike due to immorality instead of what it actually is. And now you can't understand how there can be another side to this story you've forced yourself into believing with the ferocity of a religion, no matter how irrational you know it is."

Green eyes flickered upward to study him, wary curiosity fluttering beneath the slightly nervous cast of her gaze. "I thought you said you couldn't read my mind," she accused, startled by how severely her hands were shaking.

What a ruthlessly acute description of her psyche he'd shoved in her face. It had shaken her to hear it, struck her to the core to hear the spark of hope buried behind the syllables naming irrationality.

Was it possible that she being unreasonable? It didn't seem that way, but perhaps that was just another of the many things about which she was simply wrong.

Azrael smiled at her, and it was impossible to ignore the admiring lurch in the pit of her stomach that met it. "I cannot," he assured her. And yet how could he have known so much about such secret things if he couldn't?

"But—"

"I do have a fair bit of skill when it comes to the reading of the emotional aura." He sent her a glance that was distinctly assessing in nature; assessing and somehow sympathetic. "I have watched you mature," he explained, "and during that time I have watched your mentality shape itself into this warped state of paranoia, and watched it eat away at your soul."

The retort was thrown from her mouth, high-pitched and sharp with defensive reflex. "There is nothing the matter with my soul! Sex is _wrong. _End of story!_"_

She was on her feet without knowing how she'd gotten there, hurt and infuriated by the implication that she was warped and even damaged. But before she could take more than a few steps toward the kitchen and freedom, the fingers of one powerful hand had snared her wrist to hold her back.

Furious, she yanked at his grip only to be refused a second time when the pressure of his hand would not give. Yet it didn't hurt her. He never hurt her; he simply denied her the escape of isolation.

"Wait a moment," he implored. The compulsion behind the plea was softer than the caress of a silken feather, brushing against her with all the warmth of a mug of hot coffee. "Does my presence disgust you? Does I cause you fear?"

How he could ask such a question with a tone that was so perfectly and calmly casual, she couldn't begin to fathom. He seemed entirely unconcerned with the personal edge it took, while she suffered a shock of shame for having driven him to ask it at all. She could give him nothing but a tiny shake of her head.

His empty hand slid beneath her chin, touching just the barest amount of his skin to hers as he coaxed her into turning to face him. "And my touch?" The gentle brush of his knuckles across her cheek caused her heart to tremble like the wings of a newborn bird, the flutter of comfort, tranquility and, very faintly, hope.

The sensation of his hands was nothing like that of the man in the Hall. The nearness seemed right and good in the places where the stranger with the glaring reddened eyes had been so utterly wrong; from the spark of warmth that began wherever they touched to the smooth scent of his skin. Did that mean she could set aside everything she had taught herself to believe for him?

He was her guardian, her protection against anything that would ever threaten or deceive her; he gave her safety, gave her light when it was dark, and all he ever asked for was her trust. After such generosity, all the adoration and kindness, did she have any i_right/i_ to fear him? But she didn't really fear him. Not in the way he meant.

Again she shook her head, resolved to his intended point.

Then he was moving slightly closer, leaning forward, and his lips were pressing boldly to hers for the briefest of instants. A pure white heat flooded her, setting fire to her blood, her chest swelling with the pounding beat of her heart. The swarm of butterflies didn't make her anxious, but the flaring, itching urge to wrap herself around him like a straightjacket _did._

She had recognized this feeling before, but in her innocence she had been unable to put a name to it. This time she was sure. _Desire._

No…no, no, no, no, _no!_ This was _bad._ She should have been furious. She should have been insulted. She should _punch_ him! But there was no point in fooling herself any longer.

She had always known, somehow, that denial was a lost cause. She couldn't completely justify it, the comparison to an indulgence in something forbidden, decadent, and unlawful; but she had known it was there. And now the relevance simply didn't seem to exist any more.

It hadn't taken her long to realize that she liked his kisses. They granted her a few precious moments of escape from the usual confinement from her unconscious prison.

But that was just the problem, because everything rational told her that feeling this way was a betrayal to her independence. She didn't need a man to make her comfortable in her own skin. So why did she feel that she never wanted him to let go for terror that she might fall apart?

He released her then, pulling back to take a long, lingering look at her. She was staring up at him with such confusion that it seemed to pour from her eyes like insubstantial tears, fighting between understanding and disbelief. It was as though she had been blind from birth and suddenly shown how to see; as though she simply couldn't comprehend the possibility of her own suddenly desperate hopes.

Ever so softly, he murmured: "I don't think you truly believe the things you say, but only you can decide."

With a sigh, his lithe, wolfish figure turned, the fingers of one hand crooking to sketch a series of lines into the emptiness. When he lowered it, the air seemed to shimmer and warp and a bundle of shining black fabric materialized out of nowhere and draped gracefully over Azrael's waiting arm. His jacket – left behind because he had gone out of his way to aid and protect her.

The glossy fabric embraced his torso with a mute sheen of alien fabric, and he did up the zipper and buttons with a steadiness of closure and finality. As though there was simply nothing more to say.

It was strange how much her chest hurt. "Are you leaving?"

Part of her rejoiced; eager for time to be alone to deal with the scrambled mess of her thoughts. But the other part was saddened and heartily upset, fearful of abandonment and concerned about the sudden crushing pressure on her heart.

"What if that man comes back and—"

"He won't," Azrael returned her gaze. His eyes had taken on a shade melded with the cloudy gray of sorrow. "I have this place guarded beyond the reach of any outside danger. You are safe here." His step was light and steady, the heels of his shoes almost silent against the linoleum of the hallway.

She trailed after him like a nervous duckling, fidgety and fretful. "But I don't want you to go…"

But she did. But, no, she _didn__'__t._ She didn't know what she wanted.

Regarded her steady, empathy a shifting warmth in his eyes and a sad twist to the smile he offered. "I apologize, but I have visitations to make. And I imagine you require some time to think."

When her eyes fell to the ground, her own sorrow clouding the air around her with loneliness, frustration and anxiety, he reached forward and wrapped her in his arms. Out of reflex she stiffened briefly, but soon she had forgone keeping up appearances and slipped her own arms around his waist. The palm of one hand smoothed back her dark brown hair.

"I know it's difficult…" he whispered. "Believe me, I know. Trust that you'll find your way when you're ready."

"But I—" Hadn't Beelzebub said he needed her support? She couldn't just let him leave with so much left unresolved.

"You must patch your _own_ soul before you can begin to heal another," he told her gently, hushed to the point that her human ears had to strain to hear.

Her lower lip began to tremble. She didn't want him to leave, no matter what he said – no matter what _she_ said. It probably pained him to be in the same room with her when even _she_ didn't know what she wanted, but knowing this only added to her confliction. She could only push the paranoia aside for so long. Like it or not, she would have to find a way to face and challenge it in order to find what she truly believed in.

Unable to keep from wilting, she buried her face in his shirt to fill her throat with the rich, soothing scent of him and whisper, voice half-broken: "I don't want to be alone."

"You're never truly alone. I told you, even if I'm nowhere near, I can always feel you—and if you take a moment to try, you will feel me too." His lips brushed her cheek, a kiss of satin and lace to offer a quiet kind of solace.

As if by magic, her tears faded, comforted by the press of warmth and love that his embrace gave to her. It relaxed her long enough for her to gain a semblance of control. "Now," he pulled gently away, giving her a soft smile and chucking her gently under the chin. "No more fretting, we'll talk more soon. But for now, I will say goodnight."

His image faded and blurred like watercolor paint until it simply vanished within a breath of a moment. He was gone; no door needed.

Simply gone.

It was at that moment that Lilith came to a decision. With the taste of his empty disappointment and hurt lingering in her mind, she realized that she was tired of the way things were.

Azrael was not like her father. He was not like Kevin, nor any of the other nameless, faceless men she shied from, fearing ill-intent or pain. He was different; he spoke of things that she had never thought could be, things that she had never thought she could want. He inspired her to better herself. And, truly, she was tired of feeling like a fearful, ignorant child.

But she knew that simply _acknowledging_ that he was neither an enemy nor an unwanted intrusion wouldn't break her of twenty years of habit and assumptions. It would take hard work to become as comfortable with him as she wanted to be.

But she was determined to try.

As she sank into the couch, her eyes full of the night sky clouded by winter cold and studded with stars, she found herself hoping that the angel's thus far inexhaustible supply of patience would last long enough to guide her to that newfound goal.

...

The old woman had been bed-ridden now for over four months, her lungs as good as dead, collapsed into uselessness with little purpose left to them. Her death had been predicted by the doctors and specialists for several weeks ago, but the woman possessed a streak of resilience and had hung on for almost a week longer than would have been expected; simply not ready to give in yet.

But regardless of the pain and of the liquid rattle that was her breath, she was still incredibly sharp.

Almost immediately she had been aware of the presence in her bedroom. Her eyes dragging open and her breath rasped with a harsh parody of normalcy as she questioned: "Who's there?" Aged, tired eyes peered around the darkened room in search for the unknown intrusion.

It was only a minor surprise. The approach of death affected many humans when they neared his embrace, their senses knowing how to trace his nearness even if they couldn't understand what it was they felt. In many it struck fear of being watched or haunted by an unseen predator. To a rare few, however, his presence drew curiosity and interest. It seemed that this woman was one of the latter.

Her aura might have been weak and flickering, but there was no fear anywhere within the slowed pulse of fading light. Only determination that she have an answer.

"_Who__'__s__there?__"_

"I am, Madam." He stepped forward, shedding the concealment charm to become visible to her waning sight.

The curtains were drawn, her family having deemed any outside light to be detrimental to their dying grandmother, but he took hold of the shade with one white hand and bared the glass to let in the silvery glow of the moon. The pale luminescence lit upon his form like a soft spotlight, his face turning toward his bedridden charge. "There is no need to fear."

Her gaze was steady for a dying soul's, if feeble; her eyes showed no apprehension, no anxiety, nothing even close to the terror that many of them usually displayed for him. In fact, she didn't seem surprised at all. Even when he came forward to perch lightly on the edge of her bed she merely studied him with a searching appraisal.

"You're him? The Reaper?"

The inhuman glow of his figure dimmed, sorrowed by the usage of such a loathed term on the lips of such a brave human.

"You don't like that; do you…" she murmured, not without apology. "Well then, what shall I call you?"

He offered a kind smile. "Only what I am, Madam."

"Oh, bah, I'm no _Madam._ That makes me feel old and feeble, though I suppose I am anyway." She returned his smile, her wrinkled face kindly and teasing. "And what _are_ you, Master Death?"

"No master," he answered, resting the tips of his fingers to her throat. She was close now; her body struggled to keep up with the massive demand of effort it took to keep her alive. "A mere servant to my calling and a slave to reality. I am nothing but a dream in this world," his smile turned delicately wry, "a dream for the dying."

The woman gave him a look that was unbearably close to pitying, but it was a pity mingled with quiet care. She lifted her own hand, bone-thin and trembling though it was, and laid the back of it against his not-quite hollowed cheek. He looked at her with surprise. Very few had ever possessed the courage to touch him of their own will before, and the woman's calm gave him a startlingly solid taste of comfort.

"You have gentle eyes," she croaked, what was left of her gaze steady to his own. "Not a Reaper, then, but an Angel."

She sounded so relaxed, as though nothing in the world were dark or troubled, as if he _weren__'__t_ projecting an aura filled with worry and woe. Her gnarled, withered hand slipped from his face, too weak to keep it lifted, to fall heavily to the bedspread.

"Are you ready?" he murmured, pushing away the strain of emotion weighed upon his mind to slide into the other side of himself. _Death: _mercy, rest, and light. The hand of peaceful slumber and a mask of endless dreams, the immortal setting aside the tender heart he bore like a talisman and a brand beneath his chest.

"I think so."

"Then come," he bid her, reaching inside himself for the pool of his magic, the violet well of fire blooming into life as he took hold of a tiny thread of power and wove it slowly around the dying woman.

Silently he stood from his post, straight and tall and regal – gleaming with the prowess of an immortal, his voice calm and sweet as a song. "Rise, and walk with me."

Her breath stilled, tired muscles losing grip upon the jagged pieces of pain, heart ceasing to beat as the blood ran cold. Her form shimmered, the translucent figure of her soul parting from the physical body it left behind like shedding an unneeded skin. As easily and simply as that, she was dead, truly and officially.

Her soul form was different from her physical one, lighter, absent the weight of worldly age and much livelier. She peered about with an expression of unabashed surprise, noting the lack of pain and ease with which she could move; the simplistic ease of death.

He held out his hand, waiting for her to take it. But the woman merely gave him a thoughtful glance, eyebrows rising with a mixture of surprise and amused appreciation as she looked him up and down. "My, aren't you handsome! You must have one lucky girl waiting for you out there somewhere."

While he tried to hide it, his shields slipped to offer a quick glimpse of pain to the woman's eyes. Her expression melded into one of concern and she studied him with a careful patience, almost maternal in tone as she noted; "I was partly teasing, but I see I was more correct than I thought. Except…things aren't going well?"

He avoided her eyes.

"I see." She got to her feet, standing an even foot and a half beneath his gracious height. "Don't give up on her yet."

With a magenta flash, his eyes flickered toward her, praising her astute impression with a breath of surprise and quiet curiosity.

She took his proffered arm, her elbow hooking around his, and patted the back of his hand in a consoling manner. "Love is like a baby bird, delicate and easy to frighten. You just need to be patient, teach it to understand that it's safe to fly." Her wrinkled cheeks flushed lightly, having newly realized to whom she had been speaking.

Unable to keep from smiling, he murmured, "Thank you for the kind words." Then he inclined his golden head to her, lifting his empty hand to gesture to the window. The glass panel slid open with a smooth, seamless snap, allowing in the crisp, wintry breeze from outside. "Now, let us see you home."

The press of water to their faces was familiar, the spelled liquid drawing their steps as he led her forward down the dark hallway of mist and sweet-smelling perfume; the road which led to the realms of the dead. To the left was hell, to the right, heaven; pathways he had navigated for so very long that knowing it no longer seemed to be a chore. Vague as it was, pattern was a comfort equal to an old, favorite book, allowing him to focus on keeping the despair at bay.

This particular time, he veered toward the right.


	19. Rhapsody of Blood

**Chapter 22  
**Rhapsody of Blood

Recommended Listening: "Right Where it Belongs" by Nine Inch Nails  
and "Mad World" by Adam Lambert

* * *

"You got it?"

A wiry hand waved in dismissal. "Not quite enough. I'll have to figure out a way to get a little more—it shouldn't be a problem. But more importantly, are we still in agreement about what's to be done?"

The blond glared at her companion, turning up her nose in distaste as the red-haired man knocked back yet another tumbler of a liquid that smelled like a potent mix of arsenic and paint-thinner. Instead of taking the glass he nudged invitingly toward her, she ignored the drink in favor of sneering. It was difficult to ignore the pressure of his stare over the glass rim, a piercing look directed by irises the rusty color of old blood; but she managed a single nod despite her ire that her partner hadn't accomplished his goal.

She propped herself against the counter of the bar, grateful for the rowdiness of the human populous about them, which would make it more difficult for any eavesdroppers to overhear their hushed discussion.

"I would assume so." Her answer was short and terse, anxiety in her tone despite the carefree way her elbows folded atop the cool bar.

His chuckle was hoarse, tinged with a dark amusement, white teeth bared in a grin to display a pair mildly elongated canines which drew tiny dagger-points against his thin lips. He indicated the full tumbler with a toss of his crimson head, "I didn't poison that, you know." As he said it, he thrust his own glass toward the bartender for a refill.

The look she shot him was scathing, but she didn't take the drink. Instead she spoke, her voice pure suspicion, "how do I know I can trust you to keep your word, Overseer?"

Eyes the color of blazing coals narrowed, the man's head turning toward her with painfully slow precision to look at her, eyes sparking with an eerie flash of temper. She winced, pulling unconsciously backward and away from his hellish stare; but when he banished the glare to give her what could possibly have passed for a smile, she convinced herself to calm.

"Relax, babe, I'm not going to bite you. It wouldn't serve my purpose."

He swallowed his liquor, then stood from the stool and stretched his brawny body. With a glance at the untouched glass that sat before his confidant, he snagged it, drained it, and dropped it nonchalantly to the bar, where it rolled, idle and dejected.

"I've got just as much riding on this as you have," he said, "I'm not going to turn on you. Just make sure you keep him occupied for longer than five minutes."

She glared at him, insulted rage coloring the aura around her like a spray of bitter-scented perfume. "What exactly are you implying?" she snapped, angrily tossing her honey gold hair. But he simply turned with a laugh and another insolent salute, his steps prowling and steady as he weaved through the throngs of intoxicated, music-drugged people.

As he passed through the door to leave the club he flexed his powerful hands, the nails darkening under the illusion of paled lights to stain with darkness. They lengthened, the tips narrowing as they stretched and hardened to a length just beyond six inches.

Humming to himself, he snagged a passing boy – prepubescent and thinking himself the height of coolness to be out so late in such a place – and buried his claws in the tender human throat.

"Just distract him when the time comes, slut," he hissed, the sound underlined by the pleasure of watching the monstrous act of a violent death. "Fail me, and I'll have your eyes for an appetizer."

* * *

The room was a classic example of Gothic taste. Polished, black stone formed the walls and floor, striped with wine-red carpets and drapes of rich red velvet. Trellises of thin, black-wrought iron climbed along the molding to support silver candelabras that dripped like teardrops from the ceiling. It was beautiful in a dark, vampiric kind of way, embellished and furbished with spider-spin replicas of times in history very few then remembered.

Sleek black leather upholstery created a slick kind of friction beneath the silk of his slacks when he sat, cool and smooth against his hands. But when he looked up, he wasn't focused on the room's dark, glorious beauty, but at the other man who entered from a far door.

Beelzebub's hair was plastered to his cheeks and neck, having just been in the bath. He shook it like a dog, scattering droplets of water, forming a mane of slim, silvery spikes that formed a metallic counterpoint to the plush red towel he was clutching around his waist.

Raking a clever hand through that mess of hair in a half-hearted attempt to tame it, he considered the question called to him from the other room. "Ehh—I did some digging, but I haven't been able to find anything."

Disheartened, Azrael's expression hardened around the edges, the lines of his cheekbones and jaw cast hard shadows across his face under the candlelight. "_Damn_it. I was so sure…"

"If Asmodeus has been visiting the mortal realm," the demon prince shrugged, "then he's being good about hiding it."

Azrael snorted.

"Well, what explanations do _you_ have, then?"

"I have none, Beel; that would be the problem." With a sigh, the angel leaned backward; flopping across the duvet, back arching over the edge and the tips of his pale hair brushing the rug. "There's nothing I can do about it right now. But something odd is going on and I don't like not knowing what."

With thanks to his experience in dealing with Azrael's moods, Beelzebub sensed the need to provide a distraction. Something _was_ off, the stink of it was rancid; but as their combined efforts had unearthed no results as to a blamable source, he couldn't sit around and let Azrael stress himself into hysterics. And considering the angel's utter devotion to his charge, it wouldn't be wise to leave the angel to his own resources tonight.

"Psh," the demon scoffed, dropping the towel and sauntering to where Azrael sprawled and stuck a toe into the angel's ear, "that's just your paranoia talking."

Yet the seraph showed a rather incredible display of patience, ignoring the foot prodding the side of his head and treating his demon friend to an icy stare that didn't quite reach the level of intensity that would symbolize anger. He didn't even move to bite him, which would have been a commonplace retaliation where their friendly spats were concerned. "It's hardly an issue of paranoia if Lilith is threatened. And if something got a taste of her blood—which I hope didn't happen—I would assume that counts as a threat."

"So would I," Beelzebub agreed, mildly. "But you're not really in the best shape to deal with it, are you." The only response was a cool stare and a pair of pursed lips, and that was when he got an idea. "Come on," the demon pressed, sounding as though he was subduing giddiness. "Let's have a spar. You'll feel better."

At the prospect of beating the stress out of his body, Azrael's eyes lightened and his mood seemed to clear while he sat up to follow his friend to the training grounds out in the waste of the desert.

Halfway between a void of nothingness without distance or span and a rocky, craggy plain riddled with a fine gray powder, the desert (called thus only because it lacked another, more fitting name) stretched all the way around the palaces and dwellings of hell, from the shelter of Purgatory to the pits of Tartarus. Contrary to popular belief, the majority of the realm's landscape was not swathed in fire or choked in the fumes of brimstone. The fires were located beneath the ground level.

The landscape of hell was not hot; it was cold.

The training grounds were located roughly halfway between the palaces and Tartarus' gates, an area cut into the face of a shallow plateau, flat with gently sloping sides. Smoothed and firmed by age, the ground was cloven and scratched and scarred by spells and physical blows, but every mark made lay beneath a sheet of absorbent spells which had been cast to create a glass-clear layer over the real ground.

The shield absorbed the abuse dealt by magic and force alike, filling the scars which riddled the floor so they wouldn't upset the fighters' footing. Haven of the Ghosts – the highest class of soldier in the realm, it was an open place for those wishing to practice and hone skills, or even those who simply wanted to pick a fight.

There was no one to witness their arrival. The waste was barren and empty, which wasn't all that uncommon in times of peace. Therefore, there was no one to see Beelzebub standing at one end of the flat Grounds stark-naked until he supplied himself with a flexible suit of leather conjured from the air.

Judging by the limbs left open to the air by the cut-off hems at elbows and knees, Azrael could tell that this would be a very physical sparring session. Thus he followed the demon's lead, spelling himself out of his lounging clothes and into a firmly-fitted pair of slacks and swapping his shirt for one of plain, close-fit sleeveless cotton.

"No magic, got it?" The prince's silvery tone was playful, his pupils dilated with anticipating excitement to become thin, snake-like slits.

"I assume you mean anything excessive?" Azrael confirmed, an inquiring gesture made by holding up the index and middle fingers of his right hand, both pressed close together with a spark of white.

A pale, clawed hand dismissed the question with a shallow wave, the skin shimmering under the silent, irritable flashes of ice lightning which illuminated the skies like a snap of temper. The shine of silvery scales highlighted the contours of the demon's arms and lower legs, his bare feet curling and elongating, reshaping into the wicked formation likened to a human's vision of a velociraptor. A single clawed toe on each scaly, reptilian foot held tense and ready to strike.

"Be my guest…_Shinigami._" Beelzebub's lips pulled back in a crooked grin, flashing a glimpse of sharp white teeth and dragon's fangs dripping with venom.

The returned smile was cool and suave, Azrael's step quite calm under the face of his friend's half-changed form as he strode out onto the shielded floor, tiny grains of sand crunching beneath the heels of his boots.

To anyone unfamiliar with the two fighters, it would hardly seem like a fair contest, because surely the demon was better equipped for victory, armed with teeth and claws. But those observers wouldn't necessarily be right. When sparring, they were fairly evenly matched because neither really had a real, desperate need to win. But when it came to the matter of a true fight, when one of his hands wasn't tied, Azrael was a power the likes of which very few could stand against.

Violet eyes alight with the adrenaline he adjusted his position, tucking his left arm to lay the outside of his wrist against the small of his back, right arm held out before him. Bent slightly at the elbow and wrist, he held out a single hand, fingers straight and stiff and his body held tall in a strict, deceptively harmless guard position.

This could have been bad news for his opponent had the agenda not been a friendly fight, and had the aforementioned terms not included a curb on outside magical strength. It was the stance belonging to one of the angel's most powerful close-range weapons. But they were only shedding stress; enjoying a therapeutic workout. No one would be severely maimed, at least for now.

Voice light and airy, the angel bid gently: "come." The demon, with a leap and a slash of silver claws, complied.

And it began.

* * *

No one had expected Linda to be gone that morning. And since two Library Assistants were needed to open, Renee couldn't be expected to manage the desk on her own; which left April with no choice but to find a substitute for the ailing Linda. It was a stroke of luck that found them staffed with a ready substitute.

Though, strictly speaking, Lilith was only qualified for _substitute_ desk work, she knew her way around the tasks that were handled at the circ-desk as well and intimately as a regular worker. Most of it entailed knowing how to access patrons' records, taking money for fines and checking out materials, none of which was very difficult. She was happy to be of help, and took to sitting meekly at the desk chair with an able, if slightly distracted, grace.

Distracted being the key word.

She had done a lot of thinking the night before while baking batch after batch of cookies – the majority of which were sitting on the break-room table. The patterned tasks of mixing and arranging had soothed her battered, jostled brain as it tried it best to process.

Once she had calmed down enough to look from a rational point of view, four batches of double-chocolate chip cookies later, she had been so tired that she'd lost the determination to pursue any more thinking. But upon waking the next morning, she'd been rather pleased with the results, if a bit disconcerted by the amount of baked goods loading her countertop in Tupperware boxes.

The conclusion she found: her self-elected warden was more informed about her personal issues than she had initially thought. The informed story of her developing psychological profile had been startling. It had been something of a blow to her self-esteem, digging into just how troubled and warped she had really turned out to be.

Yet after a small bit of sulking about his being right, she had come to decide that the issue at hand wasn't his knowing, but the wedge her childhood demons had crammed between them. She didn't know if she was more upset by the fact that he'd known more about her problems than she had or that he'd said they were more important than where their relationship stood.

Yet knowing that had also solidified her determination to be a better, more secure person; which couldn't really be a bad thing.

The early morning rush seemed much more hectic than usual, but this was most likely due to her presence outside the back room, working with patrons instead of materials. Almost immediately after she had unlocked the doors and retreated back to the desk, a small line had formed.

"I'll be with you as soon as I can," she addressed the four waiting patrons, and smiled at the small boy standing a little awkwardly beside his mother. "What can I do for you?"

The woman rested a hand on her son's shoulder. "I was hoping to get him set up with a card—is he old enough?"

With a light tilt of her head to one side, Lilith observed the boy. "How old are you?" she asked him softly, smiling gently.

"Seven and three-quarters," came the mumbled reply, and his mother gave his shoulder a squeeze of praise.

Lilith nodded. "That's plenty old enough."

Reaching down and opening one of her drawers, she extracted a form and set it on the counter along with a pen and explained; "this is the application form. All you have to do is go fill it out at one of the tables over there," she pointed toward the cluster of rounded study tables set up behind the reference desk, "and bring it back to me when you're done. Then I'll get you your new card! Sound good?"

The boy's small, clean fingers tentatively extended, sliding the sheet of paper toward the edge of the desk and plucking the pen somewhat awkwardly in his fist. "Ok," he mumbled shyly, tugging at his mother's hand, steering her toward the tables to fill out his application. The mother sent a thankful smile toward her, which Lilith returned before turning her face to the next patron.

The man that approached was voicing a problem he was having with the laptop he was borrowing, but her eyes flickered to a point behind him, where she the next patron waited. He was anxiously tapping one foot; arms crossed over his chest with a book dangling from one hand as though it might turn around and bite him if he was any less careful.

She held up a finger for the computer man to pause for a moment to call: "I apologize for the wait! I'll be with you as soon as I can." Then she turned back to the laptop in question, apologetically asking its borrower to repeat his query.

"It turns on, but it won't let me access the internet," the man informed her, "I think there might be a disconnect with the Wi-Fi."

Lilith reached for the side of the computer's thin body, searching for the networking switch. "Sometimes the connection gets turned off accidentally," she pressed the button until it lit up with a tiny orange light. "We'll reboot it and see if that helps."

"That's _it!__" _

The anxious patron next in line shoved his way out of the queue to stalk forward, slamming his book down on the desktop and glowering down at her, completely ignoring the indignant remark from the man she had been helping.

She blinked, startled by the hard impact of the book, and glanced down at the cover, noting that the item was something she vaguely remembered as a theologist's claims about the negative aspects of organized religion. It wasn't something she would have chosen to read, but that wasn't what libraries were about. Putting on a polite accommodating expression, she asked, "is there something you needed help with?"

A finger was jabbed against the cover of the book. "I found this trash on one of your display shelves. How can you put this out where someone like my grandson could reach it and start turning away from his proper Christian family?"

_Wow._

Radical, voraciously opinionated people were common enough, and there was nothing really wrong with that. But there were few people out there without enough social civility to keep those opinions to themselves in a public place like this.

Lilith was proud of her calm, collected answer. "The library's policy specifies that everyone is to have access to any and every kind of information. We don't directly endorse or ban any of the content found on our shelves, we just endorse our patrons' rights to them." She indicated the book in question, "it was probably displayed because someone thought it had a pretty cover."

But that explanation wasn't good enough. The man's voice rose in volume, cracking with his vehemence as his assertive finger became part of a tight-knuckled fist. "What kind of screwy system is this, blatantly supporting terrorists and sinners? I want this blasphemy off your shelves!"

A tiny twinge of fear trickled down from the base of her spine, an ice cold finger tracing the tiny indent down her back, her eyes on the angry man's clenched hand and her brain awash with calculations regarding reach and how far back she would have to move to be out of range.

She moved slowly backward an inch, then two, trying to use the empathetic strategies intended to deescalate anger that were taught to every library employee as she murmured, "I'm very sorry you feel that way, sir. If you'd like the item removed from the shelf, I'd be happy to give you a number to reach my manager. I know she would want to hear your concerns—"

"D'you think I'm stupid?" he barked, and suddenly he was bordered on the edge of livid. "You think I can't tell when someone's trying to get rid of me?"

Knowing full well what she should do, Lilith slid her hand toward the keyboard, the movement snail-like, her wide eyes fixed to the angry man's hands in case he got physical. It was rare that anything like this happened at their library, but since it was a public place, it did happen. For those time when and if it did, April had engrained two things into her workers' heads: don't panic, and call the police.

Judging by the level of the threat's temper, she could gather that informing him of her intent to alert an authority would not help the situation; it would probably just provoke him. Alerting Renee in the back room was the best option, because Renee would know what to do once she saw the man. But it was hard to focus on pressing the right button when half of her was terrified that the infuriated patron might actually send a punch her way.

It was clear none of the other patrons were going to be of any help, either. Most of them had scattered upon recognizing the signs of a probable conflict, leaving her without any kind of support or credible witnesses if something did actually happen. She focused on feeling for the backroom call button, trying to block the spark of fear threatening to blind her.

"—you listen to me, you brainless little—"

"Is there a problem?"

She recognized the voice the instant she heard it and her eyes snapped upward, her entire body washed simultaneously warm with relief and cool with shyness after the turn her last encounter with her guardian had taken.

After spontaneously appearing out of nowhere, Azrael had positioned himself so that he blocked anyone's view of the desk before gripping the incensed man by the wrist. The veil of raven black hair beneath the navy jacket hood threw her off, as did the pair of dark glasses shielding his eyes. But it was the subtle, not quite palpable thread of compulsion threading through the air to fix itself in a chokehold around the threat's neckline that solidified her familiarity.

Azrael's face tilted just slightly toward the shorter, plumper, and significantly less imposing man to give him a look so cold that she could almost hear the crackle of ice.

Lurching out of the angel's intentionally loose grip, the man thundered his way out the door, muttering something which sounded suspiciously like "heretics and terrorists." But he left, and that was all that mattered to Lilith.

"I thought not," Azrael mused, and he sounded rather bemused. He abandoned watching the man's clumsy exit in favor of turning his eyes to Lilith, who still sat rooted to the spot, finger hovering over the call-button, and lifted a single, oddly dark eyebrow. "Planning to call the cavalry on me? And here I got dressed up just to avoid attention."

His teasing jolted her out of the shock. She relaxed, knowing that there was no need to alert Renee now, since she knew the angel posed no threat, and let her hand fall to curl loosely at her lap. "Your hair," she indicated, still with some surprise. "You dyed it?"

"For the day's ventures," he replied, tone amiable and calm, and lifted a hand to remove the glasses shielding his violet eyes. "I take it you disapprove?"

That wasn't exactly true. He looked equally striking with the black strands streaking his pale face, but it wasn't quite _him._The look she envisioned with his name was always one of sunlight, warmth and brilliance.

"No," she mused, "it looks nice, but it's not really what I'm…used to." She suppressed a grimace of dismay, annoyed by her own lack of eloquence.

The smile she received in response was touched with humor. "Alas—I must be bleached to be handsome. _C__'__est __la __vie!_"

She couldn't help but smiled back, charmed by the ease with which he tossed the foreign words into the air, the grace with which he molded the sounds with his tongue and melodic voice. The words had become a familiar colloquialism; yet hearing them from someone who was probably comfortably fluent in the language (among who knew how many others), was somehow magical.

It made her feel like a little girl again; young and curious to find something wonderful and special in things as apparently mundane as being multilingual. What exactly made it all so surreal and mystical when it came from him? Because she knew what he was? It made her wonder how many other things he knew, had done, could do still with the same lightweight ease.

Quite suddenly she remembered where she was and gave a start, guiltily peering around him to check the reference desk for Jill, the acting manager. No one was paying much attention now that the angry patron was gone, but she still felt a little self-conscious talking to her…sort-of significant-other on library time.

"Um, I'm sorry," she whispered apologetically, a little disappointed despite herself, "this really isn't a good time for me to talk and I don't get off until five—"

He shook his head. "Unfortunately, I have visitations to make tonight that can't wait. But I wanted to ask if you could come to rehearsal an hour earlier tomorrow, if it's possible?"

"That's fine," she answered, curious, "I only work a five-hour shift tomorrow."

"Very good," he rewarded her with another smile, one dazzling enough that it caused her to catch her breath for the lurch at the pit of her stomach. "In that case, I will bid you a good evening." Head inclining slightly, he turned as if to go and paused, eyes caught by the book which had angered the banished patron. Touching the cover briefly with a fingertip, he mused, "this is an excellent book; quite brutal."

Then, after a quick slip of laughter he slid the shaded glasses back over his eyes, murmuring, "Until tomorrow, My Lady." Then he departed, striding gracefully out the door.

It wasn't until that moment she noticed how much of a hurry he'd been in. Yet he hadn't made her feel rushed, hadn't made her feel like a single errand featured on his lengthy list of things to do. She supposed that was what made her keep staring after him long passed the point when he'd let the front door close behind him, well on his way toward whatever meetings he had scheduled.

Every time he was in her company he gave her the brunt of his attention, every inch of him attuned and oriented completely to her, perfectly aligned to whatever she happened to need from him. And all she ever did was panic and push him away.

Feeling guilty, she finished her shift at the desk, helping the patrons that trickled her way, including the boy applying for his first card.

She had only been allowed a small space of time during her lunch break to puzzle over what possible reason Azrael had for his request. By the time they were closing up, she found herself mildly surprised by how fast the shift went by, and also thankful for it; happy to be leaving and anticipating whatever it was tomorrow would bring her.

What was more, her mechanic had called to tell her that her car was newly repaired, so she planned to bus down to the shop and pick it up, then drive back home for a hot bath and a good few hours of the history channel. There was a comfort to her plan, but as much as she was eager to get her car back, she was just as eager to be home and relaxed.

The bus ride was brief and quiet enough to please her, and once back inside her beloved Toyota again she could feel herself perk up from sheer joy of a heated journey. Entering the apartment already warm to the bones was pure bliss, and only encouraged her desire to prolong the sensation with a bath.

Upon stripping and submersing herself in hot water however, she couldn't help taking a moment to eye the curved contours of her legs and hips under the liquid. Her palms traced the slope of her stomach, moving upward over the ribs to pause just beneath her breasts, disheartened by what she found.

Lilith had never thought herself more than faintly pretty, though she supposed it was commonplace to be self-conscious about one's own looks. But she had never dwelled very long on the subject, either; in her opinion, she had been made as she was and that should have been good enough for everyone else. But when she took in the span of her own face and body, she was unhappy with how disappointed she felt.

Excluding the vast array of emotions and feelings the angel had filtered through her, this was probably one of the worst, simply for the hollowing affect it had on her. It had been eating at her all day, the inadequacy.

Gripping the soap, she scrubbed herself down, the vigor with which she scraped her skin pink almost brutal, as though she could rub the feeling away.

Droplets of water slid along the edges of her figure when she stood and reached for the towel. Her pale skin painted with liquid diamonds which slipped toward secret places that would have driven her angel to his knees. But she couldn't see it. She felt comely and insubstantial compared with him. Even when looks weren't supposed to matter…it was difficult to rationalize that sentiment to her brain.

Freshly clothed in clean pajamas and slippers, she padded into the kitchen and fixed herself a plate of leftovers from the Greek restaurant close to the Library. With the smell of garlic, lamb and the pungent scent of grape leaves to fill her with the comfort of hot food, she curled up in her chair and flipped the television onto the first boring news segment she found.

The slough of negative stories about fires in California and mass shootings in an Everett mall were somewhat depressing, the repetition of weather and sports a little irritating, but the footage allowed her to distract herself from everything else.

Until the sun rose the next morning, she managed to avoid all thoughts of inadequacy and romance.


	20. Allegoria

**Chapter 23  
**Allegoria

Recommended Listening: "Bailamos" and "Ring My Bells" by Enrique Iglesias

* * *

It was a rare thing to find the classroom empty during a rehearsal week, but she noticed upon entering the studio one hour early, as promised, that most of the lights were off. Out of the four rows of fluorescent white bulbs, three spotlights were casting a pure, clear luminance down toward the treated hardwood floor to draw a strangely pale shadow across the mirror.

But upon second glance, she realized that it wasn't a shadow at all, but her guardian.

He was seated, as motionless as a statue in a casual meditative pose with his long legs crossed and feet tucked beneath him, hands resting softly against his knees. His bare feet, she noticed, were slightly small for a man's, delicate and fair, yet they looked as strong as the rest of him was.

He was so still, frozen in such a perfect way that he seemed carved from ivory; a masterpiece of Michelangelo's at the center of the studio floor. There was something different about him today, something deep; something that she sensed even if she couldn't see it with her eyes, despite that he seemed completely at peace. Though his eyes were closed and his shoulders free of tension or stress there was a strange new element to the man who had taken the post as her guardian.

She hadn't realized how intently she stared until the angel's eyes slid slowly open and his pale head turned to look at her. By the time she got over the knot of air caught in her throat, Azrael had turned his face back to the mirror, eyes once again closed.

"Good evening," he greeted, and his voice as calm and pleasant as a spring morning. Beneath that smoothness was the tiniest hint of strain.

"Hello." Lilith deposited her bag just inside the doorway.

"I don't mean to pester you," she began, unsure what she was supposed to be doing. She had assumed he wanted to talk about something, but on the other hand, that didn't really explain the necessity of being at the studio. And though it had seemed like a fine idea yesterday, now that she was there in his company, she felt a little anxious. "But was there a reason for coming this early?"

"I apologize. I did ask you here, I'm merely taking a moment to get my Chakrain hand." She gave him a significant look and though he couldn't see it, he seemed to feel her confusion for he defined briefly: "my personal energies."

Concern flooded through her, echoed in her voice when she asked, "you're not feeling well?"

He shook his head briefly. "I'm fine, merely taking a precaution. It's my—time of the month, if you will."

She almost laughed at the odd reply, but of course he explained without being asked.

"Every mage experiences a number of days during each lunar cycle during which it's more difficult to handle moods and emotions." He exhaled softly. "Tempers are harder to keep cool, power becomes harder to rein in, stresses magnify because it is more difficult to look at them reasonably."

She smiled with a sympathetic understanding. It gave her an odd feeling of connection to know that he suffered every month as she did. She didn't know any details, but it was kind of nice to know that his tolerance for PMS-ing girls was probably much larger than any human man's. "I know the feeling. But at least you don't bleed."

Laughter lilted from his throat, warm and rippling with amusement, "no, I don't bleed." One slender white hand rose to beckon her over with the bend of two fingers. "Come and sit. We need to talk."

She did as he asked, mainly because she was curious, but also because she felt a draw to be closer to him. Her knees bent, lowering to the floor directly across from him, her back against the cool surface of the mirror. "What about?"

The rigidity in his posture eased as he folded his hands demurely in his lap. "We have a small problem," he murmured, and the smile slid from his features until they lay smooth and blank as marble.

"Problem?" she repeated cautiously, unsure if she should be concerned.

"With this dancing situation."

Azrael sighed gently, and with a soft flutter of dark lashes his eyes opened, pinning her beneath the deep, piercing irises. In the span of a heartbeat the color shifted from violet to pale lilac, when he told her: "You're afraid."

She stared at him, stunned by the blatant statement that had fallen upon her ears like a slap. Suddenly her temper flared; infuriated by the all-too-masculine assumption that she feared him. How like a man. Just when she had begun to think that maybe he was different from the rest of them, he had to go and pull a stunt like this.

"I'm _what_—?"

He held up a hand to cut her off, possibly sensing the danger of imminent protest. "You misunderstand. I'm neither naïve or arrogant enough to assume that you're some helpless damsel quick to find distress simply due to my presence." His eyes adopted a flush of pale blue that reminded her of affection and pride. "You are very strong, Lilith. Stronger than I think you realize. But you _are_ afraid."

"I am nothing of the sort," she snapped, crossing her arms over her chest, hating him for his utter, unshakable calm.

Normally she was grateful for his unending supply of patience and serenity, but just once she wished he would lose that prim, proper manner and genteel tone. Just once she wished _he_ would be the one to lose his temper instead of her.

"It's hardly something to be ashamed of," he remarked with a mild shrug of his shoulders. "I told you that you needed to sort out your own feelings—your own priorities and desires—before we attempt to move forward in any aspect. And I still stand by that."

She merely regarded him with a tinge of apprehensive resentment.

"I know you want to proceed with this show, and I don't blame you because I know how much you love dance—"

"What's the point?" It was rude of her to interrupt him like that, but she was at a point beyond caring. First he insulted her and now he wasn't being clear. Her patience _did_ have its limits.

Something sparked within his eyes then, a bright flare of color that struck down her argumentative mood the minute she saw it. That flash of color and darkness was a shift of mood violent enough that its effect quelled her little tantrum instantly; anger, surprise, frustration, she didn't know exactly.

Whatever it was, she felt herself moving as though to distance herself from his retribution like she would have from her father's quick temper and quicker fists. It was an unconscious reaction engrained into her psyche, as he himself had lined with ink. Immediately she folded into her own body, making herself small and unimportant, trying to seem too insignificant to warrant punishment. It was her only hope of self-defense from someone who could snap her clean in half with his bare hands; as she knew he could.

But his reaction to that mouse-like huddling made her remember his promises, his gentle words and protective action on her behalf. She remembered how the sorrow in his eyes had hurt her when he'd said she had to mend her own soul before she could heal another. And she squirmed with guilt when she saw that same sorrow begin to appear then and there.

His eyes softened to give her a look that was clearly an; _I __told __you __so._

"You see? If you still fear a blow from me, then I cannot see any feasible way to make this work." He passed a hand over his face, finally freeing her from that powerful gaze. "This goes beyond knowing what you want. There's not enough time to please Jessica _and_ fight your fear."

Her head tilted to the side, peering at him with a grudging understanding turning her mood from quarrelsome to resignation. He was right, after all. They couldn't be expected to perform flawlessly in less than five months if she kept flinching whenever he caught her off-guard.

"In order to find a solution to a problem, one must first admit that there is something to improve," he explained simply. "Through accepting the presence of that fear you can then work through it, dissolving the reactionary responses that spawn the frightened feeling. At first, that's all you have to do."

She lifted a dark eyebrow, smoothing her hands over the wrinkles in her dark green warm-up pants. "What are you saying, exactly?"

He moved slowly, leaning slightly forward as he murmured, "look me in the eyes and tell me that you're afraid."

She gaped, startled by the sudden closeness and the soft whisk of warm, sweet breath against her cheeks. "W-why?" the word jerked itself out of her throat. "What good will that do?"

"Because only then can you move forward," he murmured, "because only then will you be able to find peace with yourself. And because I cannot do it for you, no matter how I wish I could."

"While you're calm as can be, not a care in the world." The resentment came unbidden. She felt defensive without precedence, harsh without reason to be, and felt like a brat for it.

Azrael granted her a wry smile, his lips lifting with a kind of wistful tenderness. "On the contrary," he corrected softly, "I'm absolutely terrified. But I don't have the power to take away your fear unless you give me permission."

Her surprise colored the air like a burst of sunshine, startled by his admission of discomfort after having been under the impression that he wasn't scared of anything. If he could plunge ahead so bravely when touched with the sickness of fear (although fear of what, she had no idea), why shouldn't she be able to do the same…if women were truly as strong as men?

The truth; she _was_ afraid, just as he accused. Afraid of the strange devotion she felt to him, afraid of the fact that she wanted to be close to him, to revel in his attention, afraid of his love, just as he had once informed her.

She wanted him to be real, wanted his promises to be believable. Like every other woman, wanted someone to love her without any ulterior motive except to be loved in return. But she was terrified of finding out that he was no more than the colorful fabrication of a lie. Scared to death that letting down her defenses would result in destroying every hope she had; she had hid from his question, hid behind her excuses of pain, disbelief and false comfort in being celibate and alone.

Lilith realized that she didn't want to know what he thought of her petty fears and eccentricities. She was ashamed to show him a soul that was rotting on the inside when he treated her like a princess; shame that was a direct result of wanting to please him.

It was because she was so fond of him that she pushed him away, all the more terrified of being injured if his pretty words proved to be false. The hope he kept giving her was dangerous because it was so fragile; and while she so longed to reach out and accept it, there was still a part of her that told her to run while she could. And it was that part which drove her quiet question.

"What exactly am I supposed to be afraid of?"

He shrugged his strong shoulders, studying the sturdy structure of the wood frame that traced the edge of the wall-length mirror. The surface nonchalance didn't quite hide a trace of defeat. "If you don't have the answer yet, we might as well call this whole thing off right now."

An undefined panic clutched at her belly. Was he simply going to leave? Could he truly abandon her now after how far they had come with the choreography? And if he wouldn't let another of Simmons' students take his place, she wouldn't be able to perform the piece.

Immediately her mind shot to blackmail, but she knew better than to really believe _that_ was his intent. Azrael wasn't trying to coerce her; he was simply making an attempt to lay out the facts. If she wouldn't give a little, he had no reason to continue giving.

He was asking her to make a choice; the same choice she had known she would eventually have to make the moment Beelzebub had confided in her. But it was too soon to ask this of her. Their relationship was still too tender and new, her feelings still divided. Was she to appease her paranoia by sending him on his way and possibly risk hurting him to a point beyond repair? Or should she accept his terms and try to purge the protective security of her fears?

As she stared at him, pleading with her conflicted mind to make a decision, she began to realize that his patience only _seemed_ to last forever. He was just as strained and wearied from this unknowing as she was.

And yet as her silence began to stretch toward an awkward length, he let out a long, soft breath to murmur tiredly, "I thought as much."

The words were more for his own ears rather then for hers, but his voice grayed with disappointment. It was as though he had always expected her to turn him away…and that made her feel lower than dirt on a brand new shoe. She would have preferred him to yell, to rage or lash out; because that would have been easier to take than this quiet, defeated pain.

She could have lived with anger. Sorrow she didn't know how to swallow.

He rose from his seated position with a lengthening of powerful legs, and with a lurch like that of a slapped in the face she realized what was different about him. He was dressed solidly in _black._

A tight sleeveless shirt clung like saran-wrap to his chest and stomach, loose slacks adorned with a soft kind of shimmer accented the sculpt of hips and thighs. He had worn black before, clearly fond of it, but only in scattered bits and pieces. Never once had he dressed in only the one shade. Now she understood why.

The darkness contrasted vividly with his pale hair and even paler skin, a mythical kind of emphasis, sensual and deep, a shadow of beauty that could have turned her gaze from the sun itself. She barely heard when he spoke, her gaze fixed with morbid fascination to the small crease of the fabric between his shoulder blades.

"In that case, I'll bid you good night." And he started toward the door, meaning to leave her.

Once and for all? There was no way to know. It was now or never. Choose, or face the consequences for cowardice. Speak up, or regret it forever.

This wasn't about her past; it was about acknowledging it and moving beyond it, despite the fact that she was damaged and would always carry scars. She couldn't let that past rule her.

_I __will __always __love __you, __whether __you __believe __in __it __or __not._

Like a child lacking fine-motor control of her mouth, she blurted, "What do I have to do?"

His steps stilled just a yard from the open doorway when he stopped to look back at her, those glimmering eyes shocking straight to her heart. "Honesty between us—that's all I ask."

He could have seared her to the soul with that look had he wanted to. In even that false unnatural, lighting and swathed in darkness, his inhumanity was put into the sharpest relief she had ever yet seen. Suddenly she understood why the nymph Daphne had run from Apollo, why Persephone had tried to flee from Hades. Why some said that the glory of an angel was too pure and wonderful for a human to behold with their unworthy eyes.

Divinity was a deliciously terrifying thing to face. She could hardly believe she was being pursued by such a beautiful, powerful creature.

Her inhale was thick and hard, the air dragging into her lungs with the solidity of syrup. It was strangely difficult, as though she realized that the words blooming upon her tongue were both a promise and a gift of permission. Her choice would allow him to drive the fear from her body, to finally exorcise the demons he knew lingered in her recollections of childhood. The open-armed offer would give him power over her unlike anything he'd possessed before, but the closer she came to saying it, the warmer and more at ease she felt.

He deserved to hear the truth from her lips after all he had done for her. She owed him; but it also felt like she had finally made a decision for herself instead of for a paranoid shadow holding the reins to her heart.

"All right—I'm afraid."

The smile that caused his lips to curve was slow and gentle, but it held an undertone of such all-encompassing relief that it made her knees feel weak and watery. "I know," he told her softly. "But now we can begin something more productive."

"Like what?" She blinked, politely confused by the rapid change of topic as he crossed the floor to approach her.

"We're going to explore the element of _trust._"

He extended a hand to help her up; an unconscious gesture drenched in chivalry which she decided not to challenge by telling him she could stand on her own. She took the offer, the broad, callous-lined palm warm and strangely soft against hers, his pale fingertips skimming the inside of her wrist when he let her go.

Instead of facing her, he stepped around to take a place at her back, the heat of him seeping through her thin, ribbed tank shirt to scorch her flesh. She tried to turn, to appease the instincts screaming at her for so stupidly settling into a vulnerable position – one that wouldn't let her see him coming. But he didn't let her. That same hand rested against her shoulder and stilled her movement.

"Not yet," he said, voice quiet and patient, "this is your lesson. If I can help you with nothing else, let me teach you how to trust again."

She had told him once, perhaps even twice, that she trusted him. Or, had she? Had she truly meant it, or had it only been to lessen her own self-doubts? "I know how to trust—" she began, but it betrayed her uncertainty.

"In a way. You trust those that have won your favor over the span of years." The angel's melodic voice grew suddenly very quiet, almost tentative, as though hesitant to divulge some dark secret. He seemed less imposing, less intimidating, the glow of divinity cooled by the words he murmured with the lost uncertainty of a child. "But I don't have that kind of time…"

It was an apology for her discomfort, for her fears, for everything he had ever had to force on her. She could hear in his voice the wish that he had another choice, that he could set her free from the strange cage he kept her in, and the certainty that he would never be able to.

Beelzebub had been right; he _loved_ her. Truly, deeply, and perhaps even madly, with all the passion and fervor of the divine strength in his blood. With a start, she understood what the demon had meant beneath all the sideways analogies of festering wounds and poison.

He could have swept in the very moment he had felt the beginnings of attraction to her. He could have suffocated her with romance on the very eve of her fourteenth birthday…but he hadn't. He had barely touched her. Instead of drowning her resistance with the intoxicating weight of his power, he had given her the most precious gift he could have offered: time.

He could have done so many things; but he had treated her with the greatest delicacy and tenderness, when all the other men she knew would have simply walked all over her.

Lilith knew then that her life would never be the same. And she knew that, somehow, she had already made her decision and was prepared to stand with the consequences. She had always tried to be the best person she could be, pay her taxes, drive safely, and help those in need when she could; and this suffering man needed her. How could she think of turning away when she felt it would destroy him? How could she stand to be so cruel when he had been so kind?

She couldn't.

The melody of his voice broke into her thoughts, drawing her attention back to the masculine figure standing just behind her, pulsing with light and heat. "All you have to do is relax. Let the stress and the worry flow from your body."

His breath smoothed against the bare skin of her neck, beneath the knot of her hair, hot and sweet with the scent of chocolate. "Forget balance, forget control—just let it all slip away." He took his hand from her shoulder and stepped back to give her a small amount of space.

Like the old game of Chicken she had once played with her peers at recess, he wanted her to trust him to catch her if she let herself fall backward. Wasn't that a little childish? Glancing back at him with raised eyebrows, she mused, "And turn myself into one massive bruise?"

"You _must_ trust me," he told her gently, barely managing to suppress the tang of urgency that threatened to overwhelm the sound. "Trust me not to let you fall. _Please,_ Lilith."

The whisper was so soft that it pulled the breath from her mouth. Her spine tingled with a shiver in response to the sensual softness of the words rolling from his throat, the devotion and longing within the caress that was her name upon his tongue.

"I _will __not_ let you fall."

Instinctually, or perhaps impetuously; she believed him.

Closing her eyes, she took a shallow breath and let go. The rush of momentum as she tipped backward twisted at her stomach, nearly making her sick, and for a moment she was sure he had abandoned her to the cold, stiff embrace of the floor.

It felt like she had been falling for far too long, that, at any minute, her back would hit the floor. But after another moment, the long fingers of both his hands curled around her shoulders, steadying her with the strength of his arms. Everything stopped. There was nothing but his touch and the rich violet of his eyes boring down into hers.

Lilith blinked up at him, her stomach warm with pleasure when he praised her faith with a soft, endearing smile. "See? No bruises. We're making progress already."

Her cheeks flushed pink when he set her back on her feet. There was something very powerful about what had just happened, as insignificant as it seemed. Something had wound around them during that short moment when he had stepped between her and the force of gravity, shielding her from harm. Something she couldn't name, though it warmed her flesh and made her blood race with some emotion that was becoming less and less alien with every hour she spent in his company.

His fingers slid against the cloth at her back as he circled around her to approach the stereo in the front corner by the mirror. He stood taller now, as though her gift of trust had reconstructed the framework that held him steady.

She was a little bewildered by the abrupt shift in mood, her nerves still tingling with wariness from the threat of falling and with gratitude from being caught before hitting the floor. It was almost awkward, but not enough to deter her from her questions. "Was that it? It's as simple as that?"

How disappointing. She had expected some ordeal or trial to prove her ability to believe in him. A mere dare wasn't much of a show of faith…or perhaps there was something she wasn't following.

"No, no," he answered cheerfully, fussing with the sound system. "Now we practice."

Again the angel crossed the room, managing to glow with a luminance remarkably like that of moonstone to stand before her. "If you want to give a successful performance, we'll have to devote some time to acclimating you to the right kind of movement."

Lilith's heart sank, her spirits somewhat lowered by the implication that her abilities were sorely lacking. "I thought Jessica was happy…"

He inclined his head to her, a reverent nod. "She's happy with what she thinks is the best you can give. It's no disrespect to you that I feel that we can improve greatly if you permit me to show you how."

Despite herself, her curiosity was most definitely piqued. She loved her art more dearly than any other activity and she always strove to improve, to do better, even if that was only in holding her arms differently or refining a step. He was offering her development and education, so she felt obligated to accept.

"How?" she asked, her eagerness ringing loud and clear. She tried to seem impersonal and detached, but failed spectacularly.

The first two fingers of Azrael's left hand made a small, insignificant movement and music began to lift, floating into the air with the pulsing beat of a guitar, the quick tempo of percussion and soothing Spanish vocals. The rhythm coiled its way into her head until she fairly itched with the urge to move.

"Turn around, please," he murmured, and this time she obeyed him blindly.

She half expected him to do something by way of fixing her posture, rearranging her limbs, or even teach her a new method of grounding, but he did none of these. Instead, he closed the distance between them took her by the arms, and began to lead her in a set of slow, easy steps.

Like a mix of waltz, tango, and something very modern in style, it was a flowing, smooth kind of dance that aspired to give the sense of weightlessness. Though she stumbled, unable to see in order to properly follow the way that she knew how, his grip was gentle and his words patient as he offered quiet instructions.

"Go slowly," he said. "Ignore the hindrance to your eyes. Don't think, don't speak, just feel and the movement will come to you."

Well, that was easy for _him_ to say. It didn't seem to matter that they had been rehearsing in each other's company for roughly two weeks now; she was just as tense and tightly-strung as she had before.

She wanted to tell him it was just like an improvisational study, but kept her mouth tightly shut. Because it wasn't _really _like the studies she had done before. Those were always with her fellow classmates – her fellow girls_ – _and _this_ was distinctly different. The weight of the powerful body behind her was odd; the warmth too intense and distracting.

All she knew was that the space between her back and his torso was gone; the juncture of his hips and thighs pressed close in a way that made her heart lurch and the blood burn in her veins when he first twisted and then rolled in a way that brought a tingle to her skin. It was oddly smooth, a fascinatingly fragile meld of flesh and strength. She could have fallen to loving the sensation of being cradled and sheltered.

But just as it soothed and warmed, it also scared her. The security she had felt confused her, and the short, sharp pang of what resembled fear was what found her pulling uncomfortably from his grip.

"I just…I can't—"

Before she had a chance to work her way toward hysterics but he skillfully and gracefully cut her off. "Be calm," he pleaded, holding out his hands in the universal sign of harmlessness, "I'm merely trying to make you feel."

"_Feel?__"_ she echoed, incredulous, and his responding glance was sharp.

"Why do you assume that I intend indecency?"

Pausing, she looked at him, really looked and saw that beautiful face as open as an unlatched window. He hid nothing, neither intention nor frustration. All the same, she couldn't help but answer; "Why should I assume anything else? Angels are just as capable of sinning as humans are."

Azrael laughed, low and quiet, the sound reminiscent of silver bells. "There's no edging around your defenses, is there?" He grinned, confusing her quite efficiently with the show of pride in his eyes. "I may not be as pure as I pretend to be, but I'm not trying to manipulate you."

With a soft whisk of breath, he said added; "The style Jessica wants us to borrow from both very old and very deeply rooted in history. It's the dance of slaves, of dreamers, of the romantics—the people who used their passions to burn away the pain and the suffering that comes with life."

A single white hand passed over his face and he looked away, seemingly because he was struggling over how to continue his explanation. Yet somewhere inside her brain, she was beginning to understand. How he could restrain the blatant desire for touch in order to help her with something she loved was beyond her comprehension. How many people did she know with that kind of willpower?

"It's the dance of feeling, of sensation and sensuality. But it's also a mirror of other desires; freedom, individuality, strength…the things you hold so dearly when pushing me away."

She winced, feeling the tiny chastisement folded into the words tear at her like a thorn.

"Ms. Derre wants us to echo a moment of history that nearly strangled itself in wanting because it was governed by such restraining rules…despite what myth might have us believe." He smiled then, lightly, recollecting something she couldn't see.

"Your character," he added, "no matter how wealthy or desired or revered, would never be given the freedom to love as she wished. It wouldn't matter what she did, the relationship would always be forbidden. And that is where the strength comes from; the ability to keep going despite what obstacles are thrown by the arms of chance."

The flow of his voice stilled for a moment, only to finish softly; "to share all the desires of the heart with another is the ultimate vulnerability. To share a piece of the self that no one else has seen because it has been locked away for so long—it's both the greatest gift and the greatest power that can ever be had."

When he looked up, she didn't cringe.

So _that_ was what Jessica wanted from her? Well, she supposed she shouldn't have been so surprised. And when explained in such a way, not even the ethics of the matter seemed like very problematic. But the fact was, she simply hadn't been trained to move that way.

"I don't think—I mean…" She stumbled over her words, anxiously swallowing the knot lodged in her throat. "I don't think I can do that." Her eyes flickered in the direction of his hips, where the strange motion had come from, at once flustered and embarrassed.

"It's not difficult to learn," he encouraged, "it's a very natural kind of movement, and you already have skill with modern styles. I should be able to teach you."

Doubtful and feeling lost; she shifted uneasily, studying her feet to avoid his glance. "I don't know if I can feel what you say I should—"

Her words faded to silence, one thick and heavy with unspoken terrors and concerns, her insecurities so close to the surface that she almost felt like crying. She wanted so badly to try…but what if she failed? What would he think of her then?

He surprised her by answering the silent plea for help. His hand was warm and gentle when it slid beneath her chin, tilting her face to meet his eyes so she could see the sincerity and the devotion within them. "It is frightening beyond _all __reason_ to let another person touch that part of you—the part you want to keep to yourself because common sense tells you not to share because it isn't safe. But sometimes it's worth it…"

A soft, far-away expression flickered across his face for a moment; a wistful look remembering something that gave him a sense both of great pain and great joy. When he spoke again, his voice was soothing and certain, as though he knew from experience just what she was feeling. "The smallest inch of faith can be a light in even the darkest of places."

"Ok." The word was a whisper, a soft utterance of assent, fright, uncertainty, surprise, and granted permission all wrapped into one sound; and it came as a bit of a shock to both of them to hear.

She must have looked horrified, because he chuckled warmly, patted her cheek, and reassured, "I won't bite."

While biting had been the least of her worries, now she wasn't certain if it _should_ have been. She shifted to turn back around and was stopped by the light pressure of Azrael's hand. "I think we should try it this way now." Her eyes widened, alarmed by the prospect of having to rub up against him like a cat while facing him at the same time.

It was probably due to this fraying of her nerves that the question popped into her head, the idiocy of it making her want to laugh like a madwoman. But despite an attempt to stifle it, she couldn't quite manage to.

Stepping back when he reached for her, one flat palm held toward him, she said shakily, "one more question?"

His golden brows rose, but he was calm when he urged, "go ahead."

"It's just—I mean…do you…" She swallowed again, trying not to look at him. "Do you have, um—_you __know__—_" Her hand moved in a wild, chaotic flail directed in the general vicinity of her lower abdomen.

Miraculously, he understood, for he suddenly looked amused. The smile was a wicked upturn of his perfect lips and could have sent any weaker (or more sensible) woman into instant heart-failure. Ever so softly he prompted, "genitalia?"

Looking both mollified and ashamed, her face beet red with embarrassment, she nodded – though it was really more of a quick jerk of her head to one side.

"Contrary to popular belief, we _do_ have a distinct gender. In both forms." His expression took on a light of thoughtfulness. "Though whether we are truly fertile or not is a good question."

Lilith made a strangled sort of coughing noise with which to channel her mortified shame. "Ok then…"

The warmth of his arm encircling her waist caught her off-guard, but she only jumped in surprise. In truth, she was actually partially grateful for him breaking the stiff, formal shell of space, because _she_ wouldn't have been able to. It was nice of him to have indulged her so kindly, too, even if he had given her a look that she refused to admit had her knees trembling.

There was a strange hardness to him, something rare among human men, the like of which she had never seen before, but reminded her of a Vietnam veteran she had met when she'd been little.

It wasn't a physical thing, but a state of being. This was wisdom of a magnitude she would probably never understand, of countless years of experience, knowledge, understanding, and decision resting under that smooth white skin of his, tucked under the belt of age no mortal could see. The kind of experience that encouraged her to try.

Seeing it made her shift forward into the loose embrace, her arms lifting before she realized that she didn't know how to use them.

Lower lip pinned between her teeth, she laid her hands against the flat plains between collarbone and sternum. He was warm; the heat of his flesh seeping through the thin material of his shirt. For the first time she acknowledged how very nice that was.

Azrael took her gently by the wrists, draping one of her arms over his shoulder to curve around the base of his neck and sliding the other palm down to rest against the curve of his chest. She knew her spine went stiff, but he remained steady, his reserve of patience seemingly endless.

"Remember; your balance is crucial, but don't let it make you tense. Be fluid, be water, be silk."

Patient hands pressed at the small of her back to make it curve, shaped her hand to cup against the muscle of his chest. He even adjusted the way she held herself by lifting around her ribs to lengthen her torso.

Distracted by the trills of anxiety fizzing in her stomach, she muttered vaguely, "how is this different than club-dancing again?"

With a purse of his lips, he clarified with an almost harsh frankness, "rutting like animals?" She cringed, and he sighed, continuing to coax her ribcage away from the ballet-worthy stiffness.

"The point," he told her gently, "is to connect. The intent isn't to molest your partner; it's to invoke a sense of communion that is almost spiritual in nature. The idea of pooling energy and emotion into a more powerful force through union is one that builds upon the core of human nature. Love is just one aspect of that connection."

His fingertips pressed into the tendons connecting her collar, shoulders and back in a way that forced the joints to loosen. "_Relax,_" he interrupted his own explanation. "Fluid, not firm. This is about deeper things than just physical awareness. The sharing of hopes, fears and dreams with another person is a way to be closer to that partner in a more emotional way. That's the key to any prosperous relationship, after all—emotion."

And then he was resuming his earlier position, shifting to slide gracefully back into a complimentary station of support. "How does that feel?"

After taking a moment for examination, she grudgingly noted that she was more comfortable after assuming the more natural posture, and wondered how he'd managed to force her anxious, tight-knit muscles into calming.

"Fine, I think," she answered, "but I'll probably trip you or something equally unhelpful."

His laughter was quiet and smooth. "I doubt that. I have enough strength to keep us up."

"Maybe," she said glumly, trying _not_ to think of what his strength made him capable of, "but I still say I'm a health hazard."

"Just let your body move the way it wants to and the rest should take care of itself." He smiled when she rolled her eyes at him. "Ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," she groused.

He lifted his hand, fingers sliding deftly from her shoulder to make another flicking motion at the stereo, restarting the smooth Latin beat of the song. As soon as the notes lit the air the second time, toying with the density and color, his palms smoothed down her back to grasp her lightly by the waist before taking a step forward. And this time, she followed him with a grace that did her proud.

It was easy when she was facing him. She simply knew when, where and how he would step as though she could read it in his eyes while he rewarded her with quiet words of praise. And it felt as natural as the air she breathed to copy and harmonize with it; simple and effortless as if she were walking down the street.

This time she was prepared for the physical shock of contact and made herself relax when he pulled her with him into the smooth, rolling momentum that had so startled her before. She found that it was easier to view from a technical standpoint when facing him directly. The only problem was that she could then see the quarreling emotions warring brutally behind his marble face.

On the one hand, she could sense the tactical examination which drew his attention to the way she handled the movements and steps, nudging at her every once in a while to keep her back from getting too tense. But on the other…the flicker of heat that occasionally engulfed the centered, professional shell was just a little too unrestrained to ignore.

She did her best to remain indifferent, tried her hardest to ignore the delighted shudder of her nerves and the harried beat of her heart like the wings of a frenzied bird against her ribs. But it was a fruitless effort. There was no way she could keep cold and impersonal with his warm breath wafting across her cheeks and his careful hands molding her figure gently to his. It just couldn't be done.

Even she, the ice princess, couldn't pretend that she felt nothing but the completely opposite of tense.

She was, however, slightly dizzy. Her head spun with the quick, energetic pace of his steps, practiced ease directing the movement with impossibly simple skill. But it wasn't just the whirling arcs and circles of the room wreaking such havoc. So was the smooth, sweet scent that came from his breath and skin, causing her mouth to water.

If a cologne-maker could bottle that fragrance they would have made a fortune. It was rich and deep with the darkness of chocolate, cool like the frost of a winter morning, musky with spice, touched with the crisp quality of good, strong soap. The way it melded with the smooth shift of the muscle beneath the pearl white of his skin and the pale gold of his hair was purely and utterly devastating.

Whether she liked it or not, Lilith was completely and utterly besotted. And somewhere, deep down inside herself where her darkest secrets were kept, she knew it. As she felt the steady beat of his heart match the throb of her own inside her chest, she wondered if perhaps this wasn't such a bad thing after all.

Had she paid more attention to the purpose behind the movement she might have anticipated the dip before it came. His grip around her shifted, sending her back into a rather serious, cleavage-displaying arch over the curve of his arm.

Surprised and somewhat alarmed by the depth of the daze, her fingers automatically tightened for grip and her nails were digging into the strong curve of his pectoral muscle.

Immediately she knew that she had done something wrong; and not because she'd hurt or insulted him. She could feel the shallow hiss that slid between his teeth, the impulsive shudder that shook his powerful frame as a flush of heat gathered wherever their bodies touched. She tried to do the right thing, to move her hand away from what was clearly a sensitive place; but her arm was strangely unresponsive. The effort resulted in simply dragging her palm and fingertips down across his chest in what was unmistakably a lengthy – if accidental – caress.

While perhaps he might have been able to remain cool and distant a moment before, it seemed that this had been simply more than even Azrael's iron self-control could take.

For a moment, he seemed to forget himself. Violet eyes fluttered closed and the grip of his arm tightened to press her closer still, bringing his lips so near to her mouth that the luscious scent of his breath seemed to wrap her in delight.

His palm slid low until it reached the curve of her bottom. Yet, while the action was a little on the rough side, and while she let out a light squeak of surprise, she felt neither awkward nor uncomfortable when his grip firmed. It wasn't a hard, groping gesture; but a search for leverage, trying to fit her smaller frame even more tightly to his.

Though part of her was quite decided that she shouldn't encourage something so easily mistaken for intimacy, the rest of her found the reaction he showed her endearing. She wasn't disgusted, she wasn't offended; she was actually rather flattered.

A split second later he was pulling partially away, his voice apologetic. "I'm sorry—"

But he wasn't really. He wasn't sorry about touching her; but he _was_ sorry that he may have crossed the wrong line. The regret that he might have made her uncomfortable was sincere, and that was what won him favor.

"It's all right," she said, seeking to reassure him. "It's just that your hands are so strong—" She blushed, realizing that her statement had not retained the innocence of her intent.

The angel said nothing in reply, merely held her there, ignoring the last few peals of sound as the music died away, allowing her to find her comfort zone before making another move.

Some of the edge that had always urged her to shy away from men was driven by the reality that they were (more often than not) larger and stronger than she was; very much like predators to her prey. She felt none of that now. And when she took the time to wonder why, she realized that he had _always_ tread so carefully, to boost her confidence and do away with assumptions of helplessness.

She peered up at him, puzzled by the ribbons of emotion that seemed to bind their bodies together. Artful cheekbones, straight nose, elegant mouth, pale lips parted; surely an expert in the art of molding had created that face, that inhuman perfection imprinted into the form of a man.

The desire for touch hit her with a shock like electricity and her chin tilted infinitesimally upward, her eyes veiled by the dark lace of lashes and locked to the shape of his lips. She wasn't sure why she thought it prudent to ask first. _He_ had only once made an inquiry before acting, yet manners dictated asking before taking.

But the path between the thought and her mouth twisted a fine thread of her worry into the cloth of her words; convoluted with curiosity, impulse, and a thirst for connection. "If—if I kissed you, would you move away?"

His dark eyes flared with the magenta of surprise. She had startled him, but he recovered quickly, expressive irises blossoming with the radiating glow of passion drenched with blue. "I doubt I would have the strength to do so."

Despite this cryptically unspoken permission, Lilith hesitated. Something inside her was determined not to look like a coward, however, and now there was no graceful way to turn back. Thus, tilting her chin upward, palms braced against the firm plain of his chest, she gathered her will with a swift inhale and reached for the touch that haunted her memories like the breath of a silent ghost.

He remained very still, even when her lips brushed tentatively against his, generously offering her the reins of control. The touch of his white lips was quite cold at first, but gradually his skin warmed beneath hers, as though he took warmth from her breath. The pound of the heart in her chest was so loud that she was certain he could hear it, and she grew to fear it might break the delicate moment.

Even when allowing her control, his kiss was intoxicating. Liquid and luxurious, it was as though he wrapped her in himself. When her lips parted, so did his; when she exhaled, so did he, their breath mingling in a cloud overpowered by his warmth and the rich, spicy flavor.

He did nothing to usurp her power. But whether simple reflex or an outlet for his desire; his grip tightened around her waist; pulling her close enough to press her flush to the front of his body.

A moment later he drew back. But when he grudgingly granted her a few inches of space, his mouth closed briefly upon her lower lip, white teeth tugging gently before releasing her.

Her breath rushed from her lungs in a wave of doubts and insecurities. Studying his beautiful face, she saw into him as though his flesh had become a mirror into his very soul. The purity and energy set deep inside almost hurt her to gaze upon; so ancient and vibrant that it was beyond her ability to comprehend or define.

How could something so utterly _complex_ be kept in the body of a human? How could something like that be so attached to her? This creature had seen decades, centuries; she was just a _child_ compared with him, though he didn't treat her as such. She may once have thought he did, but that had been before she realized that his fussing over her safety was simply that; concern and care, not an attempt to cage her against her will.

"I thought you said you wouldn't have the strength," she mused, amazed by her own gumption. She was just as surprised by the flutter of happiness she felt in the pit of her stomach, and the powerful urge she had to bury her hands in the soft silk of his hair. Odd how they seemed to burn as they rested there against his shoulders...

"To back away, no," Azrael admitted softly, his voice slightly husky. "To pull you closer…always."

One hand rose to brush a loose tendril of hair from her eyes. Gentle and fleeting, the tips of his slender fingers grazed the curve of her cheek, trailing down her temple to trace the slope of her jaw and stubborn chin.

The ice around her heart, slowly melting though it had been, cracked.

It was the look he was giving her, she was certain, that caused her inhibitions to melt away. The sheer tenderness sank into her, tugging at her heartstrings and burrowing into a place so deep inside her she wasn't sure she would ever be able to get it out.

He seemed just as short of breath as she did; just as strained, just as tense, as though he were equally terrified and exhilarated as she was. And despite the weak little cry of alarm thrown out by her inner coward, the fiery brilliance of the passion he displayed made her feel attractive and desirable, not endangered.

Abruptly he released her, taking several steps backward as his face lifted to glance toward the doorway with swiftly-concealed traces of temper flashing in his eyes. His murmured explanation of "Jessica" was more than enough to make her understand.

She knew Azrael couldn't care less if they were caught in an intimate embrace, but she was grateful for the chivalrous preservation of her already damaged dignity.

Yet while rearranging her mussed clothing and patting her hair back into place, she was rather startled to note that there was resentment churning in her stomach. How strange; was she actually miffed with Jessica for interrupting something she shouldn't have enjoyed anyway? And make no mistake, she _had_ enjoyed it.

She liked the way he kissed her; there was no point in denying it now. She was actually disappointed that she hadn't gotten a chance to feel more, to make her hands obey the desire she'd had to bury them in his beautiful hair—

Jessica's cheer-laden voice snapped her thoughts into splinters and she quickly turned to see her teacher shrugging from her jacket and Azrael, suddenly at the _barre,_ finishing a set of _frappés._ "How about you, Lilith?" Jessica smiled at her, a blaze of turquoise blouse and vibrant hair. "All warmed up?"

Oh, she was warmed up all right, though perhaps not in the way Jessica meant it. Her skin still itched with heat, her lips still tingling with warmth that must have painted them red as a rose. "Y-yes," she answered, and the older woman gave her a long, curious look which lingered for just a moment too long upon her flushed face. Could she suspect?

But Jessica smiled then, replacing the disc inside the stereo with the one that contained their music. "All right! From where we left off?"

Fighting off her prevalent blush, Lilith moved to the tape marking the place she had been upon the end of the last choreography session, watching Azrael mirror her out of the corner of her eye. He took to his position with the graceful, effortless skill of a duck to water, muscles perfectly held in place, the way a master would. Was he truly a dancer too, or did he simply adapt to whatever he wished with such proficiency?

Perhaps she would ask him…someday when she had the breath with which to form the words.


	21. The Lion and the Lamb

**Chapter 24  
**The Lion and the Lamb

Recommended Listening: "Kiss From a Rose" by Seal

* * *

The session flew by, featuring a new section of choreography no less illusively suggestive as the previous portions. Yet Lilith found that she rather enjoyed the work. Somehow Azrael's effort toward her comfort had pushed her to accept the sessions with the same level of tolerance as she did those with her fellow girls. There was only one little point of variation; with him, she wasn't merely playing the part, she _was_ the part.

Every time she touched him heat flared across her skin like lightning, spiking the beat of her pulse until it raced with the trill of excitement. It was the first time she had been able to dance with him without feeling self-confined. Where once she had kept any contact fleeting and wary, this time she played coy and aloof, brushing her fingers down his cheek or his arm, toying with a lock of his pale hair.

There wasn't a single trace of fear to turn Azrael's touches sour. Not when his palm slid along the length of her thigh to guide it into a preparatory lunge. Not when he clasped his hands at the bend of her spine and caught her when she feigned a swoon. Not even when his lips brushed the smooth, pale underside of her wrist when he knelt at her feet and pressed her palm against his own cheek.

She had no more fear for him; it was as though he had banished it from her bones.

Clearly reveling in the contact she allowed without so much as a sliver of protest, he brushed against her whenever an opportunity presented itself; meeting her stroke for stroke, in perfect, harmonious clarity. Each time she managed to meet his eyes she found them glowing, lit from within by the joy of touch that came with nothing but the sheer joy of motion.

She saw those eyes, the adoration and exhilaration between the dark lashes, and felt her heart swell with the desire to break free from the confines of her chest.

White-blond strands of his hair tickled the exposed skin at the nape of her neck when he curled around her, his hands laid against her upper back. She could feel the brush of parted lips just a hair's breadth from the crest of her bare shoulder.

Dazzled by the mix of deadly sensations, her head tipped backward unintentionally performing an age-old gesture of submission and surrender by exposing the delicate expanse of her throat to someone stronger and far more powerful than she.

His only response with a light twist to the torso which paid sensual tribute to the Tango, and pressed the flesh of her abdomen and thighs flush to his. The shock was sudden and cruel; a swift spark of fire which resulted in a devastating ache, a sly little voice whispering devious things into her ear.

She wanted him to kiss her again. She wanted to feel his breath against her skin. She wanted to wrap her hand around the back of his neck and press his mouth to her shoulder, to wrap herself around him and never let go until he obeyed her mad, feverish desire to drown in feeling.

A tiny cloud of guilt pervaded the blush of senseless fascination. Would she be so cruel as to draw him nearer only to push him away again when she decided she'd had enough? Her palm flattened against his sternum to signal that it was time to stop a fraction of a second before the music cue mirrored her sentiment.

He sensed her reluctant withdrawal and eased his grip, pulling back some of the overpowering, intoxicating aura that had seemed to strengthen with his certainty in her acceptance.

She took a step back, and in her scattered state forgot about the slippery spot. The students had trained themselves to avoid the little three-inch blotch which had been neglected when the floor had been treated with non-slick solution and Lilith was no different, but the distraction – as anyone would admit – was a generous one.

The only thing that saved her from cracking her head open was her partner's timely and inhumanly quick reflexes. Yet ultimately her clumsiness sent them both to the ground.

She fell in a disheveled heap, puzzled to note that the floor was not hard as she had expected. Forcing her screaming muscles to make herself sit upright, she realized, to her chagrin and stark embarrassment that Azrael had twisted mid-fall so that his body was sprawled beneath her own.

Green eyes huge, hands braced against the floor, she stared down at the face of the man she had come to associate with protection, shelter, and disturbingly frequent episodes of affection, almost too shaken to breathe. He lay quite still – submissive and peacefully complacent – looking placidly back up at her from between the cage made of her feeble human arms. He could have broken the confinement that had him pinned with the ease of a draft horse crushing a brittle leaf.

Any other man might have tried to use the situation to his advantage, take a nonexistent signal from the sensation of abdomen to groin – but not this one. She was painfully aware of the strong ridges of his hips against her calves, the press of her knees into his sides, her bottom settled somewhat awkwardly against the juncture of his thighs.

He knew perfectly well how suggestive the position was, but he did absolutely nothing about it. He didn't even so much as breathe, which, when she thought about it, was possibly one of his coping techniques. All he did was look at her, fathomless eyes never once straying from her face, half-knowing, half-beseeching.

Out of nowhere, she began to laugh. It was completely inappropriate, manners would have dictated that she get up immediately, apologize, and continue with the session; but she couldn't seem to prevent the giggles that bubbled from her throat until her sides began to ache.

She felt a subtle vibration deep in Azrael's chest and realized that he, too, was laughing, though with much more dignity and far less borderline hysteria than she.

"Are you all right?"

Jessica's face was blurred by the laughter-induced tears gathered in Lilith's eyes, but she seemed amusedly concerned.

"F-fine," Lilith managed to choke, and disentangled herself from Azrael's limbs in order to stand, proud that she only wavered a little. She felt him rise behind her and managed to calm enough to explain, "just a little winded."

The older woman smiled. "I was wondering what happened…slippery spot?"

They nodded in unison, as Lilith saw in the mirror, and it took everything she had to keep from bursting into another fit of giggles.

"Well, I'm glad you're both ok." Jessica's posture eased from the knot of tension that came from fearing an injury. She glanced at the clock. "Twenty minutes left—do you want to add on a little more?"

They did, and so Jessica introduced a new pattern of steps for them to try. It was a complicated set and it took large amounts of focus to master, but ultimately the work allowed a graceful escape from the awkwardness of Jessica having witnessed a moment of connection she wasn't supposed to have seen.

After her students showcased a refined version of synchronized leaps and swaying, dramatic turns, Jessica actually clapped her hands with pleasure.

"Well done!" she praised while Lilith lifted a hand to brush a mass of vigor-loosened hair back from her face. "This is really coming along!"

Beaming, eyes bright as her vivid hair, Jessica approached the stereo to gather her things. "Great work tonight! Hope you two don't mind, I've got to rush—my husband's got a late meeting and I promised to meet him for dinner in ten minutes. Same time next week!"

"Sure," Lilith replied, her voice not quite belying the slightly troubled state of her thoughts.

Jessica, already out the door, didn't notice; but Azrael did.

He approached her space of floor, where she still sat as she'd been choreographed, a thoughtfully shaken expression wiping her soft, sweet features blank. After the freeing gaiety of her laughter and the devoted lightness of her dancing, it was a worrying change. Noiselessly he sat beside her. "Are you feeling all right?"

But Lilith didn't hear him; she was too preoccupied with the thoughts raging inside her head.

She had been so focused on proving him false that she hadn't bothered to wonder if perhaps _she_ was in the wrong. But was it really so wrong of her to like him as much as she did? Was it wrong of her to find his strength comforting, to admire his knowledge and his humor, or to appreciate his kindness? Was it wrong to think that maybe – just maybe – he was sincere in his affections for her?

Eyes glazed with a mixture of revelation and puzzlement, she mulled over all their encounters, recalling the words, the expressions, the vows, the touches, and finding nothing but unashamed devotion. But that couldn't be…no one alive could hold so much unconditional love for another, not without an ulterior motive. The only such motive she could imagine was the want for her physically. Yet it wasn't as if he attempted to conceal it; he kept no secret of his desires, which made it that much harder to resist him.

Sometimes she wondered whether it would be such a bad thing to let him finish the things he started with her.

It was funny; after years of being disgusted by the idea of sex, she found she was rather curious. What didn't she understand? She had thought all the joy in sexual acts went to the man, but now, recalling the gentle fire he had pressed into her skin, the smooth, delicious friction of his body to hers, she wasn't so sure.

His hand slipped beneath her chin, lifting her face so that she looked up at him. The back of it touched her forehead, pressing gently, measured and purposeful as it slid down her cheek to repeat the same gesture there as though feeling for her temperature.

His touch was delicate while he examined her face, carefully searching. "Poor girl," he murmured, dropping his hand and letting it drape across his bent knee. "I'm overwhelming you."

Lilith's eyes flickered across his handsome face, pausing for a moment at the graceful arc of his cheekbone, and then again at the soft, sensual curve of his lower lip. Warmth shivered through her body, a thick, liquid longing pooling at the pit of her stomach when she looked at that mouth. Maybe he _was_ overwhelming her. But if this was overwhelmed, then she didn't seem to care.

Her gaze slid cautiously, eagerly downward, following the elegant line of his throat until it joined the swell of his chest, veiled by the black of his shirt. Unconsciously her fingers shifted, itching to slide beneath the fabric and touch his smooth white skin. She knew what it was like to have that beautiful muscle against her palms, and she wouldn't have said no to feeling it again.

Perhaps if she played innocent, used the same manner of gesture Jessica had suggested for the dance he might kiss her again. Maybe a brush of her hand down the chest…

Startled with the progression her wayward thoughts had taken, she glanced hurriedly upward, blushing with shame. She didn't like it when boys had stared at her chest rather than look her in the face. Maybe he felt the same? Their eyes met, bright green clashing with irises that were actually formed of several rings of color; deep, royal plum interwoven with a dusky, liquid blue. In that instant, she understood.

This was the color of adoration, devotion, and desire.

"Your eyes," she gasped, stunned by the strange swelling of hope she felt between her ribs.

Words quiet and controlled, just slightly hesitant, he asked: "does it frighten you?"

Her reply slipped out so quickly that it surprised her. "No…" she said, and promptly bit her lip, immediately anxious. She couldn't take it back, because it was mostly true; but another part of her _did_ fear that powerful spark of passion amidst the amethyst.

With no warning, moving so swiftly that she hadn't been able to trace the movement, he was leaning toward her, laying one palm flat against the floor behind her. Suddenly he was close enough for her to feel the beat of his heart inside his chest. Close enough for their shoulders to brush.

The breath fled her lungs when Azrael's perfect lips brushed the corner of her mouth; a soft, sweet touch as he spoke against the flesh pinned between her teeth. "Stop that…" The whisper flowed over her like a dream made liquid, warm and thick with a low purr that seemed to slide up the back of his throat, heavy with the mouthwatering scent of his skin.

She wanted to ask, "stop what?" but quickly realized that he was referring to the way she bit her lip when nervous. It was a habit, but knew he didn't like it.

A split second later the contact changed. He turned his head, tilted his chin just right, and caught her mouth in another kiss.

Immediately she sensed that the amount of control behind the touch was not as pronounced as it should have been. Normally strict with his passions, it seemed that the angel's ability to hold back was slipping. The possessive power being forced upon her was as frightening as it was beautiful. The strength he owned pressed upon her fragile resistances with more fervor than he had ever allowed himself to show before.

It was an unconscious fragment of instinct that urged her to pull away. She strained for the breath to protest, and his lips joined hers in the movement, embracing her open mouth with the barest touches of pleading in the words he spoke with only the movement of his lips.

_Don't hide from me._

Nothing else moved, no hand, no arm, no nothing; as though the world was standing on the edge of a cliff, looking down into the darkness of the abyss. There was nothing but the silent request painted like a bittersweet coating across his mouth.

He was waiting for her to move, refusing to push her, afraid that she might just break under the trembling weight of longing. It was what made him seem harsh; a yearning so deep that she could almost feel it humming beneath his skin. Action was the only way he knew how to deal with the things she made him feel – she understood that now. She made him feel just as helpless and fragile as he did her.

She could end it easily; pull out of his arms and away from him. But she realized she didn't want that. She didn't want it to end…she wanted _him._

Her eyes fluttered, lashes forming dark arcs against her cheeks, tipping her head back to meet the lips of cream-colored ivory with a soft, and for once quite consciously willing mouth.

Azrael's throat contracted; a low, muffled noise of approval and delight rising from the recesses of his powerful chest. While slightly strangled, Lilith recognized the sound for what it was. Relief, not victory. He wasn't so arrogant as to see her permission as an admittance of defeat. It was as if a great, terrible weight was lifted from his shoulders, as though simply by trusting him with her body, she trusted him with things far more fragile.

He moved with such fluidity, the pressure and heat less calculated, less measured, less precise than it had been before. His mouth seemed firmer, more desperate than meticulous when he skillfully pushed between her lips with a warm, velvet tongue.

Yet his tenderness could have been called obscene. With every stroke, every shift, she melted further into him, weakened as though he fed from her energy.

He was definitely not as pure as some might have believed. He was an angel, yes; proper, virtuous, modest – but he was no chaste, virginal, emotionless drone as she had always imagined the angels of God would be. He was no ornamental creature designed for blind, empty piety.

This was a man who could crush even the strongest human into dust without breaking a sweat, who could split the flesh of his back to produce wings, commune with demons without obtaining a scratch, use the wisdom of an age-old scholar. She knew better now than to think him a pretty showpiece of a deity's handiwork.

This man who was older than the very earth beneath them was a creature of passions greater than the forests of the ancient world, more vivid than the sunset of a bloody autumn night, hotter than blue flame. Each of those passions filtered through her as though she was an insubstantial veil. And it was quite clear that he had wanted this for a _very_ long time.

It had always seemed so tedious when she saw couples kissing. After all, it was the same action being performed over and over again, what was so special about something so mundane and gross? But Lilith had never been exposed to the mechanics of a _real_ kiss, and now she understood it.

_This_ was a kiss.

All of Kevin's little pecks and attempted flirtations had only put her off the idea, annoying and flustering as they had been. But this…this was the kind of kiss featured in those trashy books her girls so treasured, the kind that couldn't be described because no words in any earth-made language could do it justice. It was a kiss that could turn a nonbeliever.

Azrael's fingers curled around the nape of her neck, twining with a catlike ease into her hair so she was forced to lift her chin and lock her mouth to his. And she felt as though she was melting inside, inflamed and enraptured.

It was like he had read her mind, as though he had known all along that she was pining. It no longer mattered what she had once believed. There was nothing mundane about this deadly arsenic of silk and melted chocolate mixed with the scent of roses.

Her hands wandered; all restraint long lost to the command of whim and unconscious urge. Blindly, she felt her way down his torso, unknowingly searching for something that evaded her until the moment she found it; the hem of his shirt and the naked skin that hid beneath it. The warmth of him bled into her, pale flesh smooth and firm to the touch of her tracing fingertips.

His inhale was sharp and hard, but instead of jerking partially away like he once had, he cupped the back of her knee to coax her from the shy, modest position she had adopted so he could slide even nearer. His body was cradled between her thighs; the strength of the arm braced to the floor the only thing keeping them from being completely prone.

She couldn't _breathe_…

He knew. Of course he knew; he could sense her body's need for oxygen as clearly as he could feel the racing pulse of her blood. He freed her, pulling back just far enough to give her air. His eyes were still closed while he listened to her shaky, gasping inhales, relishing the touch of her hands to the flesh of his stomach.

The soft gold of his hair brushed her collarbone, leaving a gentle trail that set her nerves ablaze, the tip of his nose tracing the line of her throat, drowning his senses in the scent of warm, sweet mortality. The scent that had nearly driven him mad.

"_A__'__uchae__ '__mhn,_" he murmured, "I cannot shield you any longer."

But she could only half hear him.

There was a reason most angels weren't allowed to be involved with humans, she thought, because surely she was dying, suffocating under the weight of the desires being forced through her. Again, no wonder Persephone had run.

Then Azrael's lips were at her neck, driving all thoughts of myths and fairytales from her head. Electricity raced through her veins, jolting her from partial confusion to pure bliss.

She had never guessed that a man's mouth could do something so…she didn't know the word for it. Her poor, befuddled brain was consumed by the strokes of hot velvet and pliant marble that slid along the line of her jugular, down to the hollow of her throat, and back up again, almost to her chin.

She trembled, but it wasn't because she was afraid. The sensation of angel's tongue and teeth softly teasing the delicate arc of her throat had nothing to do with fear.

"Unh…"

The noise was tentative, quiet, a half-hearted attempt to ask for an explanation of just why her body ached this way. But she couldn't find the will to interrupt him. In fact, she actually forced him closer, the fingers of one hand twining into the sleek, pale gold hair at the nape of his neck, pulling him down, crushing his mouth to her fevered skin as she wanted to so badly before.

With a gentle adjustment of the torso his hand lifted to cradle the back of her arched neck, warm and protective – a seemingly innocent gesture. But what he did with his mouth was anything but innocent.

The hot length of his tongue dragged slowly upward, tracing the tender curve of her lower lip, letting out a muted sigh of adoration, a sound that was both loving smile and impassioned growl. "_Mae__' __bre__'__eve..._"

The murmur seemed to settle inside her, revering and temptingly beautiful. Her hands clutched at his shoulders in an attempt to force him closer; a poorly-planned attempt, but it worked probably because he was far from the mood to resist it. Supported by his hand and forearm, he leant until her back brushed the floor, her arms locked around his neck, modesty and shyness overwhelmed by the ecstasy of touching him.

That was, until Azrael released another small sigh, this one short and silent, a mere pulse of breath against her skin. "Do you _mind?_"

She blinked, eyes flickering open, met with her guardian's bent head. Half afraid she had done something to displease him, she rifled through her bewildered brain for a way to fix whatever mistake she had made.

But it hadn't been Lilith that had drawn the angel's ire, which she discovered when a second voice replied, low and moderate, and male.

"Oh, don't mind me. Please continue."

Shock and bashful fear struck her to the core, causing her grip around Azrael's shoulders to tighten unconsciously. It was a silent plea, begging him to move so she could run for shelter, or at least so she could gain back some dignity. Being the kind of man he was, Azrael had no complaint with her sentiment.

"Unfortunately, we _do_ mind," he said, and it was short and terse with displeasure. He sat up and then stood with a smooth, graceful meld of muscle and tendon, then reached down to help her do the same, which was greatly appreciated because Lilith's joints still felt like jello.

She glanced toward the hall door and the brawny, brunette young man who approached, eyeing her with suave appreciation. He was good looking enough, with a smoothly squared jaw and wide, sculpted shoulders, but there was something about him that seemed crooked to her eyes.

"You didn't have to stop, Adrian," he smiled coyly; "it was just getting good!"

Dislike coated the back of her throat like bile. This was just the attitude that had made her avoid the male species; the dogs. She looked up at Azrael in time to see both white-blond brows lift with an incredulous indifference. As if he cared what a mortal thought about his love life.

"What I choose to do with my partner is _my_ business, Jeremy." The retort was cool and dry, a direct rebuttal against the provocation.

If tension could cause sparks, the air would have been thick with them. They stared each other down; but it would have been folly to believe it was an even contest.

Sure enough, Jeremy laughed, attempting to lessen the way he cracked under the angel's piercing gaze with humor. "Jeez—what a hard-ass!"

Shifting slightly, Lilith put herself directly at Azrael's side, her spirits and courage boosted by his refusal to be goaded, lifting her chin to give the boy an icy stare of her own. It was her show of support, her choice to stand with the man she trusted in opposition to someone she found shallow and immature. But the human man noticed and turned his attention back to her, blue eyes strangely frightening as he sent her what was supposed to be a dashing smile.

"Why don't you come with me, honey?"

Instantly she shrank in retreat. Something about the way he looked at her brought the paranoia crashing back down on her head, triggering the desire to flee.

He chuckled, "shy, huh?" A single large hand was extended as he took a step forward, "come on, wouldn't you like to be with a _real_ man?"

All she could see was that hand, reaching for her, waiting to snatch her up into ominous clutches. It sent her scrambling backward, cowering away from the man she now feared as vividly as though she had been raised to treat him thus, her alarm tangible as the shatter of glass, the terror lodged inside her throat.

With a lightning quick reflex, Azrael snatched Jeremy's wrist between fingers that gripped tightly with warning. Jeremy looked up at the slimmer, slightly taller man, surprise and flashes of barely concealed fear replacing what had been such confidence.

The angel's face was perfectly composed, but his eyes were a hard, pitiless burgundy. Eerily sudden, his mood had flared from annoyance to fury the instant the challenge had switched focus from him onto his ward. The deepened pitch of his voice caused the tiny hairs at the nape of Lilith's neck to stand on end, the smooth, languid purr underlined with a subtle threat.

"Put a hand near her again and I will remove it from your person. That goes for your other body parts as well."

With a flash of scarlet, the pale grip tightened, blunt nails biting into the flesh of the other man's arm. Steadily the pressure increased, bit by bit, until Jeremy let out a shallow yelp of pain, and was released.

Who was the real man now?

Lilith remembered the halfhearted thought she'd had once before about constantly losing her cool while her guardian remained so calm and collected and unruffled. She had wanted _him_ to lose his temper. But if this was what that temper looked like, then she wanted nothing to do with it, let alone to find herself on the receiving end of it.

Then Azrael was regarding her over his shoulder, holding out the very same hand which she knew had finely splintered the bones in Jeremy's wrist to her and saying softly; "come."

She went to him without question, taking the warmly callused hand between both of her own and letting him lead her from the studio and into the dressing room like a child being escorted across a busy street. The odd thing was, while her paranoia was screeching abuse toward an impressed (or terrified) Jeremy, it had absolutely nothing to say about her guardian.

Perhaps it was because she knew he could protect her that made her feel so secure. Was it the nature of every woman to be attracted to men they understood could keep them safe? His aura had been trembling with fury, yet when he had reached for her he had been gentle and quiet, with nothing but softness in his regard for her.

Watching him as he pulled the familiar sleek black jacket over his arms, her heart seemed to sigh with a contented wave of affection and gratitude. Her guardian angel; he had never once disappointed her. When he glanced at her with a question in his eyes, she smiled and told him shyly, "thank you."

He returned her smile with one of his own, politely inclining his head as he replied, "_pi__'__tu__schen._" And before she could even ask, he clarified, "you are most welcome."

Lilith didn't know if she had ever been more content in her life than at that precise moment.

The patter of feet preceded the interruption, but Azrael seemed to have known the secluded moment was drawing to a close. His eyes paled to a moderate lilac as he turned to face the open doorway just as a small, pretty young woman scampered into the room, very nearly colliding with him before he caught her by the forearm to steady her.

"I'm sorry, My Lord," she apologized rapidly, out of breath and dipping into a respectful half-curtsey. "Message—from Lord Sandalphon."

"Easy, Laurael," Azrael's tone was soothing and calm, and Lilith realized that the petite, raven-haired woman was actually an angel. "Surely it couldn't be that urgent."

Laurael touched a hand to her chest, lowering her soft blue gaze to the floor. "It is..."

If Lilith hadn't known her guardian's expressions as well as she did, she wouldn't have known that he was surprised. The slight crook to one eyebrow was the only indication he gave of anything less than perfect calm. "In regards to...?"

"The Records of Iscariot," the woman answered, and when Azrael opened his mouth to reply, she added quickly, "the half kept in the Hall of Memory,My Lord, not in Hell."

"Ah," Azrael's eyes darkened as he met the other angel's worried glance, "that makes the matter a bit more serious." There was a moment of silence during which Lilith's gaze shifted back and forth between her guardian and the stranger, wondering what was going on.

Then the little female was retreating from the room and Azrael turning toward her, the unknowing human, apology sliding across his perfect face when he told her softly, "I have to go."

Her green eyes lit with concern. "What's wrong?"

"I cannot say—I'm sorry." And he looked it, too. Guilt and sorrow betrayed his regret in being unable to confide in her lest the information reared its head to hurt her.

She knew then that she was half in love with him, if only for the fact that he was considerate enough to explain what little he could – even if it was only that he couldn't tell her. She wanted him to do whatever he needed to so that he could come back. And she wished he wasn't upset.

Resting a small hand against his arm, she stood on her toes and lifted her face to press a quick kiss to his cheek, smiling when he shot her a look of surprise. "It's ok. I'm like a cat; I can find my way home."

Though she wondered how she could have said something so stupid, he seemed truly heartened by the reassurance. He let his knuckles brush against the slope of her cheek, a soft, tender caress as he whispered, "goodnight, then."

He turned to leave, following the other angel into the hall while Lilith lingered in the dressing room, her stomach writhing with rather unnecessary glee.

A moment later she was running after him to call, "Azrael!" He looked curiously back at her over one shoulder and she blushed, feeling his gaze pierce deep into her heart. "Goodnight."

With a knowing smile and the black flash of a drawn up hood, he had gone. But while she felt a small surge of victory about having not acted like a complete fearful idiot; there was a sour edge to the giddy cheer that rushed like sunshine in her blood. There was something impeding on the blissful revelation that she was smitten with her angel warden.

Something felt wrong…she just didn't know what it was.


	22. Inquisition Symphony

**Chapter 25  
**Inquisition Symphony

Recommended Listening: "Highlands" by Atil Orvarsson [from The Eagle] and "Incantation" by Loreena McKennitt

* * *

"Careful…careful. Keep it away from the fire—"

Cassiel gestured with his free hand toward the document, holding the other aloft to redirect the light from the steady, lightly flickering tongue of flame cradled in his cupped palm. The vibrant orange shimmered and danced, etching fleeting shadows which were impressively heavy for such a small fire, spitting white sparks which fizzled and died as they fell across the desktop.

With a mute nod of assent, Ezekiel slowly and carefully shifted the stiffened scroll of parchment from one desktop to another. His lips moved with muttered spells of protection to fabricate a hard, invisible shield to prevent any harm from coming to the aged document; the translucent, pale green wall spreading like a large, shallow bubble to cover the fragile material. Then he turned to clear a space on the worktable.

Heavy books had been piled at the corners and edge of the table like ornamental paperweights, well-used and worn through adoration, joined by neat stacks of paperwork, pens and stone inkwells; shallow columns of magical theory. The accumulation of tools was shoved to the side until a few feet of granite showed, upon which Ezekiel set a metal dish.

"I didn't think it was possible to access our records from Hell," Ezekiel's tone was deceptively light. Soot-streaked and ink-stained from taking notes as his partner, he hid his expression of frustration under the guise of academic interest.

The coffee shade of Cassiel's complexion bronzed under the light of his conjured fire. The little spark hissed when he lowered his large hand to gently slide the flame into the offered bowl. While it choked and spluttered at first, protesting the lack a warm palm and fingers to lick, but eventually settled and calmed to a slow, continuous burn.

"It isn't," Cassiel replied, "at least, it isn't supposed to be. I suppose since the two halves of the Iscariot Records were written by the same hand before being divided, they're alike enough to be accessed through each other."

Ezekiel's russet eyebrows rose as he gathered a pile of mismatched files and carried them to a shelf. "That kind of magic and we can't find a trace of it?" Cassiel merely shook his head, unable to answer.

The two angels then proceeded to shift the table's contents, scattering the books and tools and papers to the already crammed shelves lining the workroom walls, making more room for the imminent project.

When Azrael entered, they extended a greeting, continuing to tidy while their elder and general shrugged from his coat and began rolling up his sleeves. "What have you tried so far?" he inquired, crossing to the counter opposite his lieutenants and bending over the shielded scroll to get a closer look.

"All the uninvasive methods we know to expose what he did to it," Ezekiel answered grimly, turning a book of notes on its side in order to stuff them into a small sliver of space between an abacus and a set of mixing bowls. "Leeching charms, defragmentation, even displacement spells, but nothing's worked."

Cassiel wiped the table down with a clean cloth and came to stand beside his general, dwarfing Azrael with his generous height and solid, impenetrable build, leaning with both chocolate hands on the edge of the table to observe the scroll in turn. "We even used some herbal tests to see if it'd respond to something less direct. Still nothing."

"I didn't expect any different," Azrael's tone was dry, fingers quick as he unbuttoned his shirt collar. "This is Lucifer's _manath_ we're trying to track—nothing could be more slippery or evasive. Why we didn't think to guard the Records here as soon as he tampered with the ones in the Scribes' Nest…"

Tucking the last of his books away, Ezekiel raked a frustrated hand through his wavy hair. "What do you think we should try next?"

With a shake of his head, Azrael interjected, "we don't have the luxury of taking our time. I want to know what Lucifer's up to, and that requires digging much deeper than delicate, surface-level inquiries without risking the record."

"You mean copy it?"

"If we can," the angel of death passed a hand over the pale shield, the substance casting oily, liquid patterns across the skin of his fingers. "Break down the layers, write them down, analyze them, rebuild them as the original was, and use that as a less fragile test subject if we have to."

He lifted his eyes to meet Cassiel's, inquiring of his chief lieutenant and fellow mage for an opinion. The dark-skinned angel's irises were like chips of onyx, dark and glittering as he nodded, the knot of thick black braids at the nape of his neck slipping over his thick shoulder, and Azrael confirmed with a sigh.

"All right then. Ezekiel, I want you to take notes for me, anything and everything I pass to you. Cassiel, I need you to keep me powered up."

Though the remark was empty of any emphasis, Cassiel could catch the significance of the wording. "With…?"

The Druidic lines tattooed into the guardian's powerful, tree-like arm jumped with the shift of tendon beneath his skin when he reached under the table for the steel box situated upon a shelf which formed a second edge along the table's circumference. Upon drawing a series of slow symbols into the lid, the four complex, interior padlocks clicked free. He lifted the cover to expose the vials, cloth strips, and iron needles packed inside.

The look Azrael gave the contents of that box was a dark one, black and distasteful. But as much as he despised using stimulants, he knew the likelihood of carrying out a successful dissection of the spells slathered over the record scroll without aid was slim.

From his estimation, coupled with the results stated by his fellow chief mages, he could deduce that Lucifer had spared little effort to make sure whatever he had truly done to the scroll would go undetected. While the spells looked sloppy and poorly laid on the outside, they had been laced with traps and snares to keep any other mind from accessing the secret the devil was trying to hide.

Without the aid of Cassiel's considerable magical strength, Ezekiel's impenetrable focus, and the assistance of a drug to keep his head clear and his spiritual veins open, the effort would be useless. He might even risk destroying the original scroll; which would only aid Lucifer's agenda.

"Hemlock, I think," he answered, "but keep some Nightshade ready just in case."

Cassiel compliantly pulled two of the vials from the box along with two needles and a clean length of cloth while Azrael stripped from his shirt.

As the tourniquet was wrapped and secured around Azrael's forearm, Ezekiel gathered a new pad of paper and several pens, setting up his station to take notes, a chair standing ready for whenever his general needed it. Cassiel inserted the hollow end of the needle into the vial, pulling the liquid which would allow complete access to the ambient power in Azrael's mind without requiring his focus to drive it.

Upon a ready nod from his fellow guardian, Ezekiel lifted the shield from the scroll and prepared his pen, reaching out to place the palm of his empty hand to Azrael's bare arm.

Then the needle pierced the seraph's skin to slide a dose of Hemlock into the proffered veins.

The affect was immediate. Azrael's eyes widened, the pupils enlarged to the point of nearly devouring the irises. His breath quickened, found an elevated pace that matched the rapid warming of his skin as the drug flushed through his blood.

Direct contact was required in order for the angels to communicate mentally. It wouldn't be real conversation, for Ezekiel wouldn't be receiving words; the connection was a pathway into the discoveries and deductions Azrael made as he first penetrated, then explored the layers of the spell, peeling them apart and examining the energies that had been used to make them.

It was better this way, allowing Azrael to concentrate on dissecting rather than wasting his strength via dictation. Ezekiel would be able to catch everything without missing a single detail.

Cassiel's task was to feed Azrael power, shoving magical energy into the seraph to keep him from tiring, to boost his stamina and to prevent his system from shutting down. But the hands he laid against Azrael's shoulders also served as an emergency resort in case one of the traps was particularly dangerous. If necessary, he could pull Azrael's mind from the traps, helping to fend off the devil's teeth and claws.

Azrael paid the still touches no heed. Wiping his mind blank, he reached with fingers and focus, casting out a web of magic to lock the scroll's spells beneath a net-like structure made purely of chakra power to begin his examination.

Whatever was there; it fought him _hard_, bucking like a wild horse, and. The claws scraped at him, trying to sink into his consciousness and shred him like gossamer, but he gripped it, forced it back and away. Then he dived into the spells like they were a pool of water.

From there, it was purely intellectual, prodding and poking like a scientist armed with a scalpel of pure magic to delicately sift through layers of time, energy, and craft.

Had it not been such an ominous thing, he would have thought the whole arrangement to be a work of art. The amount of care and precision in the spellcasting had been meticulous, devoted, and skillful; definitely Lucifer's work. The ice blue of the devil's aura tainted the magic like a toxin, constantly rubbing Azrael's concentration raw, raking and snapping at him like an irritable dog.

But with Cassiel's bright orange fire to beat back the defensive spells burn, the drug's potency to dull the sensation of it, the scratching of Ezekiel's pen to keep him tied to reality, he could press on. He could delve more deeply into the secrets hidden beneath the paper's surface and the ink scrawled in Sandalphon's immaculate handwriting.

— _**c.473 A.D.; somewhere in north-eastern Britain —**_

The soldiers trudged through the forest as though the weight of a thousand worlds bore down upon their shoulders.

Wearily blinking the cloud of sleep from their eyes, they staggered down the coarsely shaped path, clinking with plate armor and mail. While barely awake enough to keep upright, they didn't dare stop to rest. They had risen with the sun so long ago, assembling with speed and driven by necessity. The urgency of their crossing into the tangled wilds of the woods wouldn't allow them respite, nor could they risk it.

This was dangerous territory. It might have been their land by name and deed, but through strength and ownership by way of a more practical nature, it was far passed the reach of their jurisdiction. It had been since long before the Roman Empire had fallen and left the earth to descend into a crude and rudimentary darkness.

Their purpose was peaceful, they meant no harm to the forest, but the subject of their fear couldn't know that. It seemed strange to be seeking the creatures that would be glad to do them harm, despite the need. There was always a risk of being slaughtered with every next step; which was why, despite how tired they might have been, the soldiers tread as carefully and cautiously as they could, avoiding the darkened, bramble-strewn thickets which might have concealed traps or snares.

The men clustered close together with their eyes to the trees. The great trunks were so dense and closely spaced, so thick with branches, that it was almost impossible to catch sight of the moon, though it had risen full and round only hours ago, despite that they had yet to draw near to the center of the forest.

When the chief knight's gauntleted hand lifted to signal a brief rest, the men were both relieved and stricken with anxiety. Nursing sore, blistered feet and cramped hands from the horseless trek and the painfully steadfast grip kept upon weapon hilts. It was the height of summer, though a little wet, but the men huddled as though winter's claws were digging into their skin.

They gathered into a loose ring, their voices hushed to the point of a hushed murmur as though terrified to alert the trees to the presence beneath their noble boughs, breath stinking with fear.

Their leader alone appeared calm, sitting a few feet apart from his troop and adjusting the fit of his boots before simply going still, gazing around at the expanse of twilit green that surrounded him. Despite that composure however, he was riddled with an uncertainty that his men couldn't see.

It had been a risk to come at all, but Arthur was resigned to the fact that he needed power to win the fight he knew was drawing steadily nearer – power he didn't have. The Saxon army was a formidable force, even for his capable soldiers. There simply weren't enough of them. He needed to parlay with the creatures in the great forests, yet he couldn't deny the doubt plaguing the back of his mind, telling him that he had sentenced not only himself, but his country to death by entering there.

But he had known better than to send a decoy; they would have seen through the dishonesty. All he'd been able to do was gather a few soldiers for protection and try to journey as quietly as was possible and pray they were received well.

Any quarter they might receive if their petition was refused would most likely result in being questioned for information, then killed. He knew no fear of death, only the fate that his dying would bring; but fear didn't change the fact that without the assistance of the Druids, his people would face no less that complete extermination.

The little cross worn around his neck tapped gently against the mail draped across his chest when he turned, his voice low, against the velvet blackness which seemed to close in around them. "Let's keep going—"

The arrow flew as a whistling streak, arcing through the tiny clearing to imbed a point of stone three inches into the fallen branch upon which he was seated, quivering, black shaft shining. With it came a brief spat of chaos, soldiers leaping from their perches with shouts of alarm and of terror, trying to draw swords and daggers in the close darkness. Yet they tripped over roots and collided in their haste to find and brace against their unseen enemy.

Arthur stood slowly, almost feeling the eyes on him like a tangible weight, catching the taut creak of the bowstrings pulled to loose. The bolts, thick enough to punch through armor, would be aimed for targets that would kill effortlessly and quickly. But they didn't shoot…and that was what kept him calm.

He inserted his body at the center of the tense soldier, hushing them with words meant to sooth the snap of anxiety. Since he was their leader, the men did as he bid them with fingers that twitched at blade-hilts, casting their eyes to the brush to observe the figures gliding in close from all angles.

The creatures moved like animals did, padding silently and gracefully in a menacing, guarded way. Bows trained at the knights, the gleam of arrowheads pinpointed to chests and throats, they slid in and out of the shadowy spaces between the trees as spirits or shades.

But the shadows were people; or, they looked like people. But the men clustered beneath the threat of being skewered thought they were more akin to beasts; vicious, savage, and primitive. The bodies wrapped in leather strips and sheathed in crudely-woven cloth were mostly bare from the waist up, strapped tight, and painted with streaks of earth and plant-blood. Their eyes glittered like those of hungry wolves from the underbrush.

Legends told terrible things about the painted people; stories of the fierce guardianship they had for their forests, the way they could maneuver with an impenetrable silence they had learned from the animals, and the slaughter they had wreaked upon the Romans. It was said that it was because of these godless warriors that Briton had remained relatively free of occupation before the days of Christ.

And he was there to bargain with them. He had no choice. The plan to be located without startling the forest dwellers into immediate killing had thus far worked, but there was no guarantee he and his soldiers would make it out alive.

"Show them you mean no harm," he murmured, lifting his empty hands to display intentions of peace, "weapons away."

"But—" Someone spluttered a protest, but he cut through it with a hardened order.

"_Away,_ Galahad." He turned his eyes to the savage perimeter guards circled around his men, meaning to slaughter them without a word, and spoke more loudly. "We mean no harm to you or to your master—"

"We have no master," one of them answered him, the thick, hardy syllables of English familiar, though the tone was hostile, "Only the Merlyn."

While it was difficult to tell due to the identical dress shared by the hunters, the speaker was female. Her lighter, slimmer build gave her away, but she was as imposing as the men scattered among the ring barring the soldiers from escape. She had the same savage wildness about her, the same harrowing, bestial presence. Her eyes were like a hawk's, trained and dark, her focus to his face narrowed with uncanny knowing.

He made no move to approach, knowing that this would be seen as an attack and result in his immediate death. But he was eager now, hardly daring to believe that the pack they had stumbled upon was associated with the barbarian priest famed for both his mercy and his forward-thinking. "It is to your Merlyn I must speak."

She shook her head, sending her matted hair into a tumble about her shoulders, bone-crafted beads clinking quietly together as they settled. "No one may," she said simply, "not you."

"Please—" he implored, but she crushed his plea before it could begin.

"_You,_ Christian," she spat, "will die here." Her empty hand lifted with a signal for her bowmen to loose.

Yet it was not their fate to die. For no sooner had she shifted to give the signal, all traces of moonlight were swallowed by heavy black storm clouds that hurled them into the darkness of moonless night. Thunder rolled; rumbling deep like the growl of a great beast, and the sky split with the crack of lightning, a tongue of yellow slicing the cloud with a lash of fury and displeasure that sizzled with the smell of burnt air.

It was a sign of some sort. Collectively the Druids cringed beneath the swiftly fading noise before rapidly changed tactics.

Several of the hunters strode forward to strip the knights of weaponry – action which was met with protest quickly quelled by Arthur's warning stare – and the earth was skewered with blades, the brush littered with breastplates and slabs of armor. Though mail was left and leather jerkins were untouched, the knights were disarmed and bound with rough leather ties with their king's order to keep them complacent to the treatment. Then they were being herded deeper into the clutches of the trees.

The Druids wove and darted through the forest's uneven paths with an ease the knights couldn't imitate, and more than once the disgruntled soldiers were encouraged to hurry with sharp smacks from the edges of bows and the flats of broad, crude blades. Saying nothing, keen eyes watchful, they ushered their captives along with a mute haste as though following a command.

In what felt like no time at all, Arthur and his knights were prodded into a sheltered clearing. Lit fires sparked and spluttered, casting a harsh yellow light across whatever they touched, turning skin-tones red and leather black, and the soldiers glanced around for some kind of escape – knowing full well that there was none.

More painted people gathered as they were rounded into the clearing; civilians, children and elders, drawn by the spectacle of their civilized cousins being dragged between wood and mud-made huts into the ring of bonfires. Their whispers lilted, unearthly and strange, in the ears of their captives. The notes were intrigued, skeptical, suspicious, and even fearful.

Death loomed over the heads of the knights, who had found their stoicism and held themselves tall in preparation for whatever came. When they were force to kneel, strung arrows held at their vitals as insurance against retaliation, they remained calm.

Arthur held himself with as much dignity as he could, even when he was dragged to the fore of the others and shoved roughly to his knees. The hand held at the back of his skull was reluctantly withdrawn and he lifted his eyes to the elderly man that stood before him, clutching a thick, knobby walking stick between gnarled, ancient hands.

Voice strong despite the apprehension curling in his abdomen, he greeted respectfully, "Merlyn of the Druids. I come to you for aid and advice in dark times."

Aged eyes crinkled and dry laughter croaked from the old man's mouth, only barely touched with the harshness of a hoarse cough.

Patience worn long thin by threat of war, his eyes narrowed, angered by the humor with which his appeal had been regarded. "You mock me?"

The shake of the grizzled head puzzled him. It was a denial, but the old Druid had neither answered his plea nor made any sign of acknowledgment. He hadn't heard the Merlyn was hard of hearing, nor that he lacked at least the decency to hear a proposition posed to him. "Then why—"

"Forgive my lateness," a voice called; a low, musical tone that drew his attention from the sorcerer and toward the figure that approached.

The man was youthful, no more than five and twenty winters to his age, dressed as the common hunters and built with powerful muscle and firm, supple lines that were traced with designs of husky blue war-paint. The knight knew it from the illuminations recording the expulsion of the Romans from the land, just as he recognized the jagged-bladed knife hanging from the belt at the man's hip as a tool specifically designed to create wounds that couldn't be healed. So this was a warrior, not a hunter.

Yet he addressed the Merlyn. How dare this mongrel interject? Coolly Arthur chastised, "I speak to your _master,_ boy, not to you."

Immediately he felt the waves of anger ripple across the Druids assembled around the kneeling, weaponless knights. A silent fury shivered across the clearing, causing the fires to gutter and tremble. But he didn't understand the reason for it, and looked again to the old man, imploring, "Is this your son, or some other spokesman to answer for you?"

With another hoarse guffaw of laughter, the elder pointed with one bony finger to the young man without answering.

Arthur's brow furrowed with confusion. "What do you mean—?"

"He means that you should address me." Again came the voice, warm and clear as an autumn night that still tasted of summer; so unlike any voice he had heard from a human throat. Again he found his eyes drawn to the young warrior's form, taking in the mane of dark hair twisted and carelessly pinned to the nape and the whiteness of the carven face gazing serenely back at him.

A strange chill coursed down his spine, somehow connected to the bearing of the Druid, the way he stood, the way the angered creatures calmed beneath the hand he lifted to soothe their insult. But it couldn't be real, what he was feeling. That power he could feel in the air, swirling, alive…it couldn't possibly be from this man no older than Arthur himself.

A pair of eyes found and held his own; swirling pools lined in black to herald a magician, the rings around the pupil streaked with a color he had only ever seen the wealthiest of men wear due to its cost. The color of heather but richer and deeper; a royal color.

The young Druid smiled, pleasantly and with just the slightest touch of irony. "I am the one you seek, _Arturus,_" he said quietly, "your Merlyn. The old Druid priest you come to for council when before you would have slain me without hesitation because of what I am. Or perhaps," with a peal of laughter so pure and sweet it was almost unearthly, he gripped the shoulder of the old man whom Arthur had mistaken for him, "you would slay my decoy. Such a resemblance, no?"

"You lie," the knight snapped, half despairing with frustration and the certainty his mission had been in vain. "I came myself, with no disguise, as a gesture of good will and you dishonor me with this charade? _You_ are not the Merlyn."

Again the youth was forced to lift a hand to still the rise of ire among the people. While his expression was mild, there was a frost to his words when he retaliated, "yet you claim a desire for aid whilst entering my forest dressed for battle, your mouths stitched with distrust and your hearts sullied by malcontent." The Druid's eyes hardened. "You should consider yourself fortunate that I have deemed you worth my time at all."

"How dare—!"

"_Silence._"

All of a sudden the knight found himself incapable of speaking. His throat worked, his lungs took in gulp after gulp of air, yet no sound came out. It was the strangest and most frightening thing he had ever experienced. The myths of magic and inhuman power had always seemed paltry and overblown when compared to the composite word of God as read by the priests, but the sheer tangible quality of his muteness forced him to question.

Arthur shot a glare toward the old man, still suspicious that he was being taken for a fool, and discovered that the elder's head was bowed to the youth standing tall beside him.

"I can see that you have no ear for reason in spite of my tolerance." The Druid shrugged. "Your eyes, however, you are certain cannot lie to you."

The same hand which had gestured for quiet was held toward the knight, carefully cupped to offer Arthur a view of the sparks of lightning that danced and crackled upon his palm. Like tiny a living, breathing things, they rubbed at his fingers as though pleading for attention from the master that stroked it gently with the tips of fingers stained with herb-paint and ash.

Then, moving so swiftly that he seemed to blur at the edges, the Druid threw the bolt into the air. With a rumbling snarl of thunder, the shard of lightning clawed its way between the trees and slammed into the earth mere inches from the kneeling knight. It had struck the very place to which the Druid's white finger directed.

Arthur knelt, rigid and motionless with shock, peering up at the magician. "But Merlyn is ancient," he whispered, and was stunned to realize he could speak again.

"And so I am—far older than you take me for," the Druid priest offered a small smile, and it was then that the knight could see the expanse of wisdom that might not have creased lines in the ageless face but had touched the eyes which seemed to go on forever.

The dark head turned toward the nearest fire, offering shoulders swathed in a short fur cloak to Arthur's eyes, the white feathers at his nape catching the flickering yellow light and sparkling with silver. "You have questions," he prompted with only just volume enough to be heard.

"Yes…" Arthur's reply came with a note of hesitation, distracted by the acrid smell of the plants being crushed in the other man's palm. The sharp bitterness urged him to cough, yet he forced out his petition before the chance to do so could be stolen. "I have come to ask for the air of your people. The Saxons are—"

"We know of them," Merlyn asserted bluntly.

"Then you know their desire for conquest is not limited to Christians. They will destroy you; slaughter every one of your men and children, take your women, defile your religion, just as they will ours." He had begun to lose hope that he would get so close to fulfilling his cause, but Arthur could feel his fervor return, a warm flush of courage hell-bent on convincing these potential allies to join forces with him. "Unless we stand together to combat them."

All motion stilled, Merlyn's powerful figure pausing to turn shrewd, dark eyes to him. Under the light, Arthur could see the line of paint marking him from brow to cheekbone to chin, the blue streaks tracing collarbone and bicep and lower, faux shadows against oddly pale skin. "And you propose what, that I tell these people to lend their lives to you to spend however you will? I think not."

The light burned green when the Druid's crushed herbs were flicked into the flames, sprinkling the burning wood and filling the air with that bitter tang.

Arthur's hopes sank. Could he truly have come so far for in vain? "Can you not ask them to? They needn't follow _me_—"

"I do not condone war, no matter for what end or purpose."

"But you—"

"Arthur, son of Uther, King of the Britons," the tone was low, firm, but laced with an unexpected gentleness. "You _will_ lead a war; that much I have seen. But whether you will claim victory or annihilation, I cannot tell." When Merlyn looked away, it was to sink into a graceful crouch beside the fire. Unconcernedly he inserted a hand to let the eager tongues of flame lick at the plant juices dripping from his palm and fingers.

"But you are the _Merlyn,_" Arthur insisted, not even attempting to mask the desperation coating his voice, not caring if they heard how deeply he willed the Druids to understand the severity of the need. "They're sure to follow you—and you _know_ we must fight. Can't you see that it _will_be for victory?"

A shallow bark of laughter, cold and hard, lit the air. "I see nothing of the kind." A pale arm flexed, arcing white in the dark, hand forming a seal to mold the fire's light into a deep, smoldering scarlet. "I see blood and pain and death; as comes with all war." Merlyn's brow furrowed, his focus trained to the fire, searching with the strength of a true master in the arts of magic.

Despite that the church taught magic was the Devil's tool; Arthur didn't feel it was right to call the magic evil. The radiating aura of spiritual knowledge and sheer, shivering power seemed like nothing more dangerous than wisdom channeled into physical shape.

The magician looked troubled, his voice distantly echoed as though from across a great space. "Pieces within pieces…the future is not easy to know. Every variable changes the course, every moment of time a choice to be made, problem and solution, slivers of importance hidden beneath every layer." Abruptly, he straightened, the creases smoothing from his brow as the crimson faded from the flames.

"I know not whether you ride to salvation or destruction; but ride you will. And you will ride with a Druid bow behind you." He made a concise gesture which had the guards untying the knights' bonds and lowering their weapons.

Astounded, Arthur merely stared at the cool, pale face, hearing the Druid bowstrings relax, arrows replaced in quivers, chain mail clinking as his knights were allowed to stand, almost unable to process the words he'd heard. And then there was nothing but relief and the joy of a hope renewed.

After a word from their sorcerer-priest the savage figures began to assemble, reforming to bring forth those who would fight for their land and their freedom against the common enemy. Thoughts of war and honor and victory served as a heady wine to his soul

He bowed his head so that it brushed the earth flat and damp beneath his knees. "Thank you," he whispered, "Thank you, wise one—!"

Arthur's body went still mid-rise from the forest floor dotted with the ash of charred wood, a cool chill flashing down his back as he lifted wary eyes. The Druid priest had turned those unsettling eyes back on him, an uncanny knowing of the driving ambition that had haunted him since his time as a small boy, hearing the story of the lost cup of Christ and vowing to someday seek it and reclaim it for God's glory.

He could see the image of that dream in his mind, veiled by fire the shade of the Druid's eerie eyes and knew he was being warned away from it.

But the instantaneous spark of defiance he had felt fizzled and died when he saw the warning in the eyes of his newly made ally, feeling the ageless authority that expected to be obeyed. The acrid smell of green-grey berries swelled to singe his nose and throat, the pressure of the Druid's bearing and piercing eyes held him as though pinned.

"If you must be grateful," the Druid interrupted, staring into the fire, "be grateful for those here who have already dedicated themselves to the cause you serve. But know that they will not be content to die for your glory…nor for the grail that you will never find."

He got slowly to his feet, the pretense of humble pride in his face only a mask as he backed away with a whole new respect for powers he couldn't understand.

For the first time since he had been made king, he felt the compulsion to follow another man's orders, and the youth-born dream that had so inflamed his heart slipped away until it was nothing more than a fragment of memory.

...

Azrael's violet eyes snapped open, shadowed with exhaustion the haze of the trance. He didn't see the workroom around him, nor the pages of records spread before him, doused under the fire of the magic pouring from him in a steady, flowing torrent.

Instead of the crackle of flame or the voice of his lieutenants, the keening of battle-cries filled his ears, pounding like drums in the summer night he could smell in the place of the metallic tang of chakra, the memory like a trance of its own under the power of the hemlock in his veins. He saw woad-painted bodies, tasted the dry, earthy flavor of smoke, and smelled the blood of leaves.

There was something important there; he could sense it. Despite the exertion draining him to weariness, despite the tension curling knots into the muscle of his upper body, he knew a crucial detail he needed was buried somewhere within that scrap of time, which so long ago had been the here and now. But which portion and which part he didn't yet know.

Not yet, in any case.

That was the last coherent thought in Azrael's mind before his body slumped, wearied, into the chair quickly shoved beneath him by a waiting Cassiel. He gestured for another dose, and a needle slid into the vein at the bend of his elbow, shoving yet another measure of drug into his burning blood, grimacing with dislike at the smell of nightshade and alcohol. Yet his hands never once wavered as he began weaving the complex, meticulous combination of spells that would create the framework of a duplicate record.


	23. Forgotten Fairytales

**Chapter 26  
**Forgotten Fairytales

Recommended Listening: "Northern Lights" by Cider Sky

* * *

She was reading when she heard him knock gently upon the wall of the kitchen hallway after materializing in that strange, silent way of his. It was a considerate gesture to announce his presence before walking into the living room, so he wouldn't startle her half to death. Glancing up to greet him, she smiled brightly and put down her book.

"Hi," she murmured, somewhat shy even while a part of her felt as though she'd known him for ages. "How are you?"

Dropping gracefully onto the couch across from her he raked a slender hand though his hair, ruffling the white-gold strands. "Well enough," he sighed, "But I'm tired of thinking and experimenting, and of filing an unending amount of paperwork."

She offered a sympathetic smile, but refrained from asking any questions in case he couldn't answer, in case it made him feel obligated to tell her something he didn't have the authority (or the freedom) to share. The guilt-torn reaction he'd had the last time she had phrased the wrong inquiry didn't give her much incentive to make that mistake again.

But then he was explaining briefly: "I'm currently working on a project which requires me to invent a series of spells for a narrow and almost ridiculously specific purpose. I have to make sure they function exactly as I need them to or face unpleasant consequences. And if I have to sign one more document, I will lose my God-forsaken mind."

His pale head tipped to rest on the back of the couch, fingers parting the first few inches of his shirt-front and exposing his smooth white throat. It was an unconscious gesture, as if to encourage himself to relax and wind down. And when she looked more closely, he had an energetic kind of weariness about him, like something hyped up on caffeine that required a great deal of sleep to feel normal again.

Reaching out with one hand, she gently touched his shoulder. "I'm sorry." It wasn't that she would attempt to display that she knew what he was dealing with, but she _did_ feel rather sorry for his pain. Not only did he sound frustrated with the lack of freedom to completely share his work with her, but he also seemed to be suffering from severe overwork.

There was nothing about him that suggested any physical weariness or exhaustion. He looked as flawlessly unreal as he always did; but she could also see the tight edge to his jaw, the slightly dulled shade of the outside ring of color to his irises. He seemed so weighed down.

Seeing him look so in need encouraged her to tilt her head to the side, soft mouth open to muse quietly, "maybe you need to focus on something else?"

Her confidence in the suggestion had been faint, but to her surprise Azrael's eyes softened, brighter and richer without the gloom of internal disorder. "That's not a bad idea." Flashing her a questioning, very nearly pleading look, he added, "would you come shed stress with me?"

Her smile was shy and quizzical. "What do you want to do, take a walk?"

"No," he shook his head. "That won't be enough." He pondered quietly for a moment, silent and steady, then added, "I haven't been to the LSC in a long time; we should go there." When all she gave him was a blank look, he laughed. "The Last Supper Club—I frequent it sometimes, when I want a different atmosphere from the Hall."

With anyone else as her companion she would have refused, since club-like atmospheres didn't tend to suit her. But if it would help him then she would gladly keep him company, even if it was in some over-crowded, alcohol-drenched pit. Who knew; maybe some part of the experience would be enjoyable.

"Sure, I'll come. Just let me—um…" She rose smoothly from her seat and paused, chewing at her lip for a moment as she hesitated over how best to phrase her request. "Could I have a human minute?"

The soft, appreciative glow in his eyes was both grateful and gentle, the incline of his head perfectly gracious as he murmured, "of course." His eyes followed her when she thanked him and turned, heading for the little side-hall which led to the combined bath and bedroom.

She had a modern class tomorrow, complete with its strict bare-feet-only policy, and she needed to do some maintenance – mainly, shaving her legs.

Gathering a fresh towel from the linen closet and a pair of shorts from the clean laundry basket, she meandered into the bathroom and without bothering to close the door, turned on the water and waited for it to run warm.

"Here's a question for you," she called over the running water while she took out her can of citrus-scented shaving cream and a brand new razor from the medicine cabinet. Setting them lightly on the counter, she replaced her favorite jeans with the shorts that left her legs bare to the uppermost part of the thigh. "If the bible's fictional, how did the writers manage to get even _some_ of it right?"

She perched on the counter, settling her back into the corner between cabinet and mirror, angling one calf so that it draped over the side of the counter and resting the other foot across the sink. After using her hands to wet the exposed skin, she took the cream and smeared a thick pinkish lather across her leg. She took up the blade, gently scraping the sharp end along the line of her shin.

"I mean, how did they know to write about a Hell—or a Heaven for that matter? How did they know the archangels' names?"

Apparently having disliked the distance which had called for raised voices, Azrael entered the bathroom to lean patiently against the wall. She didn't notice that his eyes followed the movements of the razor in her hand as carefully as a hawk's, tracing the trails of skin slowly uncovered by the blade she wielded with a tedious edge.

"Adam and Eve," he answered simply. "Since they passed on their knowledge by word of mouth, by the time the information was transferred onto pages it had gone through a severe verbal strainer—the Grapevine Process, if you will. Some pieces were modified, some lost, and others kept the same. Some kept better track of the stories than others, but all their children put forth their own interpretations to the whole of what was put into an accumulation of written _books_."

He smiled faintly. "In the end, though, only a scant few were chosen to grace the pages of what is now known as the bible."

Surprise caused her hand to slip, the blade to press and slide into her skin. She huffed when the cut began to bleed, a tiny drop of scarlet standing out against the pallor of her complexion, but it was more of an annoyance than anything else, and not enough to distract her from the multitude of questions filling her mouth.

Sometimes it seemed all she could do was think up questions. But she couldn't help it; he was such an anomaly, a real-live angel. She would have liked to meet the person who _wouldn__'__t_ be full of questions.

"The Gospels were the children of Adam and Eve?" She asked slowly.

He didn't answer right away, and when she looked up she realized his attention was riveted to the tiny cut. And while the injury was minor and already clotted, his nostrils had flared, as though he could smell the coppery scent of her blood on the air even from several feet away.

He seemed to relax when she returned to the task at hand, finishing the calf and moving on to the thigh. She had to adjust in order to keep her leg over the sink, sliding her foot against the counter, knee bent and arm draped gracefully over the edge of the sink as she rinsed off the razor.

"Adam and Eve were not the only mortals God created by hand; they were simply the first, and the only ones to have seen Eden. But it was their blood alone that wrote the words attempting to explain their creation."

Nodding to show she understood Lilith touched the blade back to her skin, pressing lightly and dragging upwards along the line of her thigh. It was difficult to concentrate, for although she had performed this task nearly a thousand times before, she had rarely done so with an audience to watch her so very closely.

His gaze seemed to pierce directly into her heart with an intensity that reminded her of some strange cross between a raptor and a wolf; intent, bold, almost predatory. He neither moved nor even breathed, but with each moment that passed her heartbeat seemed to rise slowly in speed.

The deep pressure of his stare made her nervous, but it wasn't unpleasant. Sure, she felt fidgety and self-conscious, yet it was more of a shy curiosity as to why he was so engrossed in watching her. She felt like she was being x-rayed, devoured from the inside out by the penetrating power of his eyes.

Once she had been afraid of a look like that, but such looks were different coming from him; it was his way of showing appreciation without embarrassing her, without pressing too hard. He was trying to be discreet, but it would almost have been easier for him to be blunt. She could ignore words that she too often considered empty. She could _not_ ignore that look.

For the past few weeks, she had been so distracted by the flurry of activity and information that she hadn't tried to analyze what she was being given. She'd certainly tried to find a hole in the pretty words and sugared promises; but had she really tried to think of what it might mean if all of it was true?

For a moment she recalled a time when she had been smaller in more than just the literal sense. She had been a timid child, frail and sensitive to anything that so much looked at her the wrong way, cowering from anything that might have had the slightest chance of hurting her. But there was one thing that had never caused her fear – the one thing that had always lent her a caring comfort when she had thought she might just curl up and die; the Presence.

It had always been him. She knew now that all those years when she had leaned on that invisible, improbable shoulder for support, she had been leaning on him. When she had been afraid, he had offered her the courage to keep moving forward. When she had been unsure, he had reached out and given her a touch of stability. And when she had cried, when she had locked herself in her room and sobbed into her pillow, lost and alone, he had wrapped her in warmth and security, telling her in the only way he could that she was never _truly_ alone.

All those years of patient guidance, guardianship, and watchful care were reflected in him, those wise eyes showing more tenderness and respect than she had ever seen in a human man. He was so different; so strange, yet so familiar, so old and yet so very young. His hands were stained with the history of the world she was so new to, but he was so pure.

This was the angel who had sheltered her, the Presence who had helped her, and now the man who loved her. Where could she have found the audacity to question that she no longer knew. All those long-cherished morals and feministic values about the evils of men seemed pretty childish now.

Completely having forgotten what she was doing, her focus wavered and a second little cut neatly sliced her skin. Flushing, ashamed for allowing herself to be distracted by something so mundane as a pair of eyes, she cast a sidelong glance toward her silent observer.

Azrael was watching the water bead against the soft expanse of skin, following the tiny trails of liquid that slid along the contours of her naked thigh. He neither moved nor spoke, but there was something in his expression that caused Lilith's stomach to squirm. Something in that face was so powerfully enthralling that she had the split-second urge to throw herself from the counter and into his arms.

Quailing anxiously, she tried to put it out of her mind, trying to force herself to be calm. Her hands were trembling, yet she picked up the razor and valiantly attempted to finish her task…until she slipped yet again.

Her breath hissed when the blade bit into her flesh, leaving a cut longer and most definitely not so quick to heal as the others which trailed along the outside length of her leg. She reached for the faucet, thinking to rinse it clean, when her wet hand was replaced by a larger, distinctly masculine one, startling ivory even against _her_ pale skin.

She froze as the tip of Azrael's finger traced the angry wound, a slow, calculated stroke that made her skin burn despite the cool, soothing sensation left by his healing touch. The cut was gone, with no hint that there had been a mark to begin with but for the red stain upon his long white fingers. Lifting them to his mouth, the angel absently licked the blood away, apparently oblivious to the wide green eyes watching his every movement with the rigid stillness of a frightened lamb.

Then he held out his other hand, palm open, and murmured softly, "_ah__'__end __hier._"

Somehow, she knew what he wanted. Almost as if she had no will to refuse, she handed him the razor, eyes still fixed to the lips that had so casually taken her blood. Her _blood,_for the sake of everything holy!

All of a sudden he was so perilously close, and even seated on the counter she was dwarfed by his height, her personal space crushed by the weight of the bright, powerful aura that clung to him like an invisible cloak of divinity. All she could do was stare like a confused child.

Then his empty hand slid beneath her calf, palm gentle as he shifted the angle of her leg while the other rinsed the bloodied blade before touching it back to her skin. She nearly jumped, and pressed her back into the mirror to keep from jarring his hand. "What are—?"

"I'd prefer to avoid an excess of blood," he explained softly, his voice low and husky, "I make you nervous, therefore it's better if I remove the sharp object to prevent any serious damage." Sliding the blade down along the last trace of lather on her leg, he turned to the can, giving it two sharp, practiced shakes, and pouring some into his empty palm.

Lilith felt her heart bury itself somewhere behind her throat when he took gentle hold of her other leg and smoothed the pale pink substance across her bare skin, his hands moving with brief, leisurely ease to cover her from ankle almost to hip with cream. Then, without so much as blinking, he rinsed his hands, took hold of the razor and set to work with her heel propped in his left hand.

She watched him with surprise in her eyes and a shy blush coloring her cheeks as he gently scraped the blade down her shin. Oddly, she didn't feel incompetent and pressured, but as though she was being treated with care and delicate tenderness.

It seemed a bit bizarre at first, since she couldn't recall any of her girls mentioning that their beaus offered to shave their legs for them; but she found it was rather cute in a gentlemanly sort of way. And it made her hunger for more details into his world and his life.

She studied him from behind the curtain of her hair, absorbing the elegant slopes of his cheekbones and smooth jaw. How was it that he never showed signs of stubble – no five o'clock shadow, no roughness, no nothing?

"Do you shave?" she asked, her voice inhibited by only the slightest of tremors.

He paused lightly before rinsing the blade with a few quick strokes in the sink. "Not regularly. We don't actually have to maintain our appearances. If I wished for a beard, I'd simply will it to be there, and it would appear according to my mental picture." He tilted her heel to better expose the underside of her leg, allowing him access to the skin still coated with lather.

"But I have before. When dwelling in close proximity to humans, it's often wise to perform in ways that will make ourselves appear human as well." He caught her eyes for a brief instant, the flash of his smile a dazzling jolt to her brain. "It helps them accept us."

His palm slid from her heel to cup her calf, pressing the blade of the razor to the outside curve of her thigh. The touch sent a jolt of awareness more acute even than terror to trace the indentations of her spine, and instinctively she jerked as though to force a distance between herself and his hands.

Suddenly he retreated, responding instantly to her discomfort, his eyes flickering to her face. "Am I hurting you?" His voice was a tender murmur, blade-wielding hand hovering over her skin to await her answer.

The attentive light in his piercing eyes was so considerate, so caring and earnest, that it robbed her of the breath to speak. So she shook her head, because _no,_ he wasn't hurting her; he'd just caught her by surprise.

It didn't help that his hands were so warm, the calloused palms soft against her skin, or that his body was so close to hers. She wasn't sure what it was that drew another blush, but her whole body was flushed with a delicate pink by the time his hand lowered for the second time, lightly scraping the sharp edge down her thigh to bare a strip of flesh.

Using quick, sure strokes of his wrist and fingers, he dragged the blade down the outside of her leg. And apparently he was completely oblivious to the torturous discomfort she felt. The one centered on the warmth and significance of his muscular torso tucked between her knees.

How could _he_ be so emotionless when every nerve in her body was screeching about how close they were? The last time he had been so near, he'd kissed her, and how he was as cool as winter air. Where did that massive supply of restraint come from?

The hand at the back of her knee tilted her leg upward to a higher angle while the other drew a fresh new line of bare skin.

Giving the razor another quick rinse, he flipped the blade so that it lay against his wrist, the metal bright and cold in contrast to the black lines of the cross tattooed into his white skin. Then he brushed his fingers across the soft, pale expanse of her inner thigh.

It was a light, skimming touch, barely enough to even be considered contact at all, but she inhaled sharply, pressing her back into the metal frame of the mirror until the edge bit deeply into her shoulder blades. Whether to draw away, or to smother the creeping desire to curl her calves around the backs of his knees and pull him near, it was impossible to know.

Wide as saucers, her eyes flickered up to the face veiled by a jagged curtain of pale hair just in time to see him cast a fleeting glance at her expression with a quick flash of violet. It was the kind of look that opened a doorway into the deepest pits within the hearts of men.

And suddenly, she didn't feel so isolated in her awareness. In fact, she didn't feel much of anything but for the gentle, burning trails left by his fingertips.

She watched him watching her, catching the deep glow in his eyes and knowing that there was no reason to fret over the lack of a more obvious reaction. Just because he didn't drop everything and kiss her hardly meant he didn't _notice_ her. But he probably assumed that after the intensity of the last time they had been alone together, another advance might risk scaring her off. Not that such as assumption was founded.

When was the last time she had considered his touch truly threatening? When she couldn't remember, she found herself astounded by how much she had actually begun to enjoy his attention, how deeply she reveled in the sensation of his hands against her skin and his warm, husky whisper in her ears.

The thought seemed to solidify around her heart like a thin layer of cement until it fluttered, straining, against her breastbone. How fully she had come to trust him, even care for him; how his very presence steadied her thoughts and eased the weights at her back.

It was a powerful piece of truth; calming because she realized she was safe, terrifying because she knew she was in danger of being lost to something that had nothing to do with safety.

It no longer mattered that she had been a suspicious prude. It didn't matter what his intentions _might_ be, because she knew what his intentions truly _were._ All he wanted was her happiness. No lie, no secrecy, no deception; and if he happened to receive a few kisses worth of thanks, he wouldn't complain. It was all he wanted; more deeply even than he wanted _her._

Because of him she had lived to see adulthood. Because of him she had found the way to stand on her own two feet, refusing to let her battered childhood stand in the way of her scraping herself a good life. If she stumbled once or twice, he would be there to catch her…and there was no shame in that. There was no shame in wanting to belong to a man as dearly as she belonged to herself.

But nothing was that simple. Even if it had been easy to renounce a lifetime's worth of morals, whether they were wrong or not, she was broken beyond repair. It was cruel to lead him on this way, selfish to use him so, when she knew she would never be able to become what he deserved. She was only human and therefore flawed where he was perfection. Greedy where he was good.

With a few easy strokes, the rest of her leg was scraped clean and Azrael had turned to the sink, draining the cloudy water while his companion sat stiff with newly discovered shock and conflicted shame.

Her head tipped backward, numbed and overwhelmed with the pitiless depth of her insignificance, and promptly smacked the side of her skull into the edge of the medicine cabinet. The sharp, resonant ache of it blurred her eyes with tears that were more than mere pain.

She could hear Azrael's voice, the edge to the notes both startled and concerned. He reached for her, his fingers tracing the space behind her ear where pain began to fade into a dull throb to search for damage she may have inadvertently done. But before he had a chance to truly look, she had planted her hands against the cleft beneath his collarbone and forced him away.

The tears pooled between her lids until she couldn't hold them any longer and warm, wet trails slipping down her cheeks.

"Lilith?" His eyes were a startled lilac, shaded with magenta to form the color of alarm. "What's wrong? Did I hurt you?"

How sweet of him to worry only for her.

Guilt had her curling into her corner, legs drawn up to her chest and her arms wrapped so tightly around them that she might have been trying to hold herself together, as though she might shatter if she didn't. Laughter gave the choking sob a hysterical bitterness. Couldn't he see what a pathetic, selfish wretch she was?

_God,_ but she wanted to scream! She wanted to smash her head against the mirror and crush her own stupid brains in.

Then she was being dragged gently forward and though she fought him, she wasn't strong enough to thrash her way out of his arms. He held her firmly but tenderly, his hand curled around the back of her neck, cradling her like a child against his own body with the solid, unbreakable length of his forearm. "Shh," he whispered, "_please,_ darling, don't cry. I can't stand to see you cry…"

She writhed and pulled, trying to squirm her way free, but he was relentless. He simply held her more tightly, gripping her wrist to keep her from accidentally turning her hand into a bloody ruin against the mirror.

"Y-you should leave me," she finally managed to choke, her voice hoarse with the sobs that felt as though they were torn through her chest, each one a reminder of the utter horror that struck her at the thought of his absence. "Find someone better—someone who isn't broken. Someone who can give you what you want!"

While Azrael could have taken offense to the implication that he wanted her only for physical reasons, he ignored the sting of it. He knew better than to be hurt by her words. In truth, they was proof that she cared for him, because she deemed herself not good enough. What she didn't realize was that she had just proved herself wrong.

With a touch of magic to aide him, he determined that she was suffering from a minor emotional breakdown, and while it wasn't serious, it was enough that letting her sort it out on her own wasn't an option.

It was an emotional impasse. She was lost in the woods, unsure which path would lead her to the light. But she would overcome it. All she needed was patience and the guidance to give her the courage to take another step.

"And what could I want that you can't give me?" he questioned softly, trying to get her to think while she shoved at his chest with trembling hands.

"I—" She coughed, straining at his grasp before she slumped, exhausted. Yet he held her close, a comforting purchase to cling to while she floundered to get her head back above water. "I can't—"

He hushed her then, before a troubled confession could spill from her lips, and as her thrashing stilled he brushed the loose hair from her red-rimmed eyes. She avoided his gaze, shame and anxiety making her skittish.

"Look at me," he beseeched her, the thread of compulsion wound within the words gentle enough to urge her into grudging obedience. Her green eyes lifted to his face, troubled and hurt and confused all at once and his carven features softened when he looked at her, his heart aching for her pain. "I've pressed you too hard. For that I'm sorry."

Lilith flat-out gaped at him, bewildered by the apology. She had just gone to pieces all over him, so why on earth was _he_ apologizing; shouldn't _she_ be the one to do that? She watched, sniffling with some embarrassment as he produced a clean washcloth, dampened it with warm water, and dabbed at her cheeks to smooth away the tearstains.

"However, I would like to remind you that I want from you _only_ what you're willing to give." His gestures were slow and considerate, drawing the cloth down her neck to help ease the jerky spasms at her diaphragm. "You have always been more to me than flesh, Lilith. You know that."

She hung her head; her shame all the worse because he was right. "I'm sorry—"

"Don't apologize," he murmured, shifting slightly away and kneeling to carefully wipe away the slough of residue from her legs with a fresh towel. "You have a right to be stressed. I have not made this easy for you to deal with, and sometimes the only way to do so is to break down." His lips lifted with an easy smile. "I'm just glad I was here when you did."

"So am I," she admitted meekly, watching him carry the used linens to the hamper.

He regarded her with a steady perception to the ebb of discord in her mood, a wellspring of pride in his heart. There was a resilience in her, a fortitude that was both unusual and cherished in someone so cautious and he knew that, if given time, she would rise to almost any challenge he could possibly give her.

One of his hands settled on her shoulder, so small and curved beneath his palm. "Be calm," he told her. "Find your peace in your own time; and as I guarded you as a child, I will be here to help you."

For an awful, wonderful moment, Lilith was sure she was going to cry again, for her eyes had blurred and her lower lip began to quiver. But this time she was a long way from despair. Overwhelmed by acceptance and unconditional forgiveness she lurched forward, ignoring the flash of surprise in his eyes to throw her arms around his neck, unable to trust her voice with the competence to express her gratitude.

She worried that he might not hear the thanks behind her silence, but when he wrapped her up in his embrace, enveloping her in the smooth scent of his skin, she knew he had.

With a quiet sigh, she nuzzled her face against his collar, burying her fingers in the lush, white-gold silk that fell to just brush where neck met shoulders. She filled her hands with it, grazing his scalp with her nails and savoring the fragile tickle of the strands that felt almost like the stroke of feathers.

_Feathers?_

She pulled partially away to get a better look at what she surely _couldn__'__t_ have felt. But sure enough, layered neatly among the strands of hair at the nape of his neck were a number of soft white feathers. The tip of her finger skimmed along the thin, hollow spine of one, tracing the length of a single feather as though to find the tie or thread that might secure it to his hair. But they were a part of him, fixed to the skin just like a bird's.

"Ah," he mused, tilting his head to allow her close examination of the improbable divine wonder. "I knew I forgot something."

Drawing her fingers through the sleek meld of feather and hair, Lilith watched the light play on the colors; a blistering white that was very near silver because of its metallic glint, and palest, gentlest gold. For the first time, she noticed that the source of the haloed sheen she had so long marveled at was actually highlights of that same silvery white.

They were so like the feathers that built his wings that she was able to draw her own conclusion as to why she had never before seen them. "You usually hide these, don't you?" she asked, a little surprised by the regret she felt for him having to do so.

"I hardly have a choice," he answered, violet eyes serene. "It might be difficult to explain why I have feathers growing from my skin."

The questions seemed to burst from her like a deluge: "Do they show normally, or do you have to tell them to show like your wings? Is there a purpose? Do they grow anywhere else?" But then she stopped, bringing her enthusiasm to a pause while she acknowledged the soft shaking of his shoulders.

He was laughing; the rich, beautiful sound sliding up his throat and reverberating within his chest. "So many questions!" he exclaimed. "One at a time, please, I'm more than willing to answer."

He shifted to look at her, his smile hitting her face with a serene, amused patience. "They're a natural feature unless concealed, when they can neither be seen nor felt. We can grow them elsewhere—mostly along the limbs and the back—which can serve some aerodynamic purpose in aid of flying and balance. But those don't appear unless we have need of them."

She considered this, trying to imagine what a human figure might look like when sprouting feathers from its skin, but the idea was a little too fantastical for her picture.

"What you have to understand is that we're more than just a neatly spliced meld of a human body and bird wings, but a mixture of many things. It's important to keep in mind that we were created long before any bird or creature of earthly making." There was a thoughtful pause before he corrected; "in fact, it may be easier just to think of us as a completely different, or alien, species."

Strangely enough, that made sense. "I think I understand." She gave one last, fleeting touch to the soft white feathers, and let her hands fall to her lap, shooting him a look that was both shy and curious. "Are we still going out?"

"If you feel up to it," he answered, and she could tell he was trying to sound casual, when really the hint of restlessness was still prevalent at the edges of his eyes.

"I'm fine," she chirped, sliding from the counter to the floor, determined to return his kindness. "But I don't know if I have anything to wear…"

Seeming unconcerned by this sentiment, Azrael towed her from the bathroom, not appearing to realize that his ward was overtaken by the giddy notion that she was very lucky to have someone like him. And somehow, somewhere inside her, she knew that she was no longer troubled by which path to take. Because now that she had chosen, she would not be looking back.

* * *

After rummaging unabashedly through her wardrobe Azrael set out an outfit and left her to change. As she examined the pair of her newer, dressier pairs of jeans with chunky white stitching and a dressy silver blouse (an unworn hand-me-down from Alice), and she had to admit that the ensemble didn't even broach the cusp of skimpy, which led her to compliment her date's taste. His pilfering through her collection of shoes had caused her some discomfort, as she did have a soft spot for pretty shoes, but his selection of low-heeled ankle boots had been a winner.

She wouldn't have questioned his choices, since she acknowledged that his knowledge of club- appropriate apparel was much greater than hers, yet she was grateful he had respected her modesty. Even though she wasn't sure he could have found anything truly horrendous in her borderline boring closet.

As it was, the ensemble was simplistic, with just the faintest touch of flare that served to make her feel glamorous, especially when paired with the fitted black blazer left from a suit set to which she had outgrown the pants. It inspired her to fancy up her braid by twisting and pinning it into an off-center coil, and adding a pair of delicate silver chandelier earrings.

Feeling pretty and just a tiny bit eager for the promised outing, she headed for the living room, assuming to find Azrael waiting for her. But what she found was just on the cooler side of shocking.

In all the albeit short time she had known him, she had never seen Azrael in anything but relatively conservative, finely made clothing. Tonight, however, he had swapped his classic shirt for one of a tight, dark blue t-shirt beneath an open suit jacket of a sleek metallic grey. Yet these were nothing next to the pair of form-hugging pants, expertly fitted and cut entirely out of glossy, genuine leather.

She stared as though she were looking at something completely alien, half scandalized and half intrigued by the new edge to the angel she had always pictured as something of an old soul in a young man's body. Somehow she had never been able to picture him in anything less than a button-down shirt. Seeing him dressed like a teenaged punk was almost unreal.

Her eyes followed intently while he used the small mirror in her dining nook to aid him as he fussed with the hair just brushing his collar. The feathers had vanished, but what was truly interesting were the oddly transfixing swipes of his fingers through the pale strands and pulled them back into a small tail. When he made a sharp downward gesture with his empty hand, the fine mane of golden hair was neatly severed to leave choppy, shortened layers behind.

She gasped, unable to restrain her horror. Appalled by the waste of such perfection, she took half a step toward him as though she wanted to take the cut tail from him and attempt to force it back into place.

Upon noticing her alarm, he laughed softly and explained that the new haircut was only temporary. "We grow our hair with our will, so it'll be back by tomorrow just as it was," he said, mussing the shorn, newly styled hair in a way that did rather suit his handsome, angular face.

While not quite altogether calmed, his compliment to her choice in jacket brought her a smile that she couldn't seem to shake. It lingered on her lips, warm and flattered; especially when she noted the way his eyes lingered at the smooth lines of her collar bone, framed by said jacket, as he accompanied her outside.

The club of which he'd spoken was located only a few short blocks from Lilith's apartment, just across Washington Street from Occidental Park, toward the water of Puget Sound. And despite his claims that he frequented the human haunt for a change from the Hall, it didn't seem anything like she had imagined because, in truth, the similarity to the atmosphere of Beelzebub's house was surprisingly evident.

They had the same roughened exterior promising a lush, exotic interior, same undercurrent of thudding music and alcohol; the same undertone of sex in the air. For some reason she had pictures something with a little more sophistication. But then again, this was probably considered quite high class for a nightclub.

When they approached the line of patrons awaiting entry outside the dusky building titled with glowing white letters, it struck her how very reserved her clothing was. Everyone else was dressed in clinging, fitted cloth and fishnet, displaying miles of leg and great quantities of cleavage or chest despite the harsh chill of the temperature. The realization that the dramatic change in her guardian's clothing choice might have been to make up for the lack of sparkle in her own outfit struck her as both bemusing and somewhat touching.

But she only had a few moments to eye the waiting throng, and no chance to work up any good fits of anxiety. Before she had quite registered how very not in her element she felt, Azrael was leading her along and passed the line to approach the bouncers blocking the door with an air of cool purpose.

While the angel's stride was swift and strong, he turned his head from her to take a swipe at his eyes as though to brush away an irritant. She wanted to ask him if something was wrong, but then he was speaking softly with the blockier of the two men, gesturing to something in the vicinity of his chest, and the bouncer moved to admit them inside. Though she skirted by the large man with only a mild squeak from her paranoia, she couldn't help but notice the multitude of eyes pinned to their backs, following them before they slid between the double doors.

Azrael paused inside the dim, blue-lit brick hallway, casting his eyes out as though searching. The opportunity to adjust to the environment was appreciated, and Lilith understood the difference between the two clubs rather quickly. While the underlying edge to this new place was similar to the Hall's, it was a haven for demons of a human nature, not an immortal one. The difference was almost tangible in ways that didn't really make sense.

She turned her head to look at her guardian, and jerked a little with surprise. "What on earth—?" she began, stunned by the reality that her prim, proper guardian angel was wearing makeup.

He laughed, amused by her display of shock. "Another detail to blend in," he explained patiently, "and it's not actually eyeliner. It's Kohl."

She quirked an eyebrow, "and that is…?"

White teeth flashed in the dark lighting with his strangely predatory smile, an edge aided, she assumed, by the combined effect of darkness and the fine lines of black tracing his eyelashes. Somehow, without being told, she knew he wouldn't answer.

His pale bangs reflected the blue lighting when he turned and began walking in the direction of the nearest open doorway just as a new group of patrons trickled in from outside. Lilith assumed he would enter and almost ran right into him when he stopped just outside, keen eyes flickering around as though trying to spot something blending so seamlessly in with the background that even his inhuman eyesight couldn't track it.

"Where is she?" he murmured, not without some finely hemmed annoyance. "Running late as usual, no doubt."

Peering up at him, she inquired, "who?"

"Your chaperone," he answered vaguely.

"My _what?__"_

Azrael's moved to become another, less vivid smile. "Did you wonder why we were admitted so quickly?"

She nodded. Of course she'd wondered; there had been a line out to the street, yet he had just waltzed right by without a care in the world and the bouncer had allowed it, which had seemed an impressive feat to Lilith, since the man had looked strong enough to break through a wall.

"That's because I didn't come here to dance or drink." When he turned his eyes back to her, they seemed to glow like violet stars lit with the blue from above. "I came to sing."

Her breath caught, throat tightened by the sheer prospect of such a thing, yet before she could reach for him, demand to know whether or not he was serious, his attention was divided again, swept away from her and toward a new voice that split the already humming air. She frowned then, disconcerted by the level of distance hanging between them – distance that didn't seem entirely natural.

Since her partial breakdown in the bathroom, she wasn't sure she could remember him venturing to touch her for more than a few split seconds at a time. He hadn't even extended the usual courteous offer of his arm while walking down the street. She didn't find the lack of it offensive, but she had been growing accustomed to his sweet, absentminded little touches; the brush of fingers to her cheek or hand, sweeping the hair from her face, that kind of thing. The space he seemed to have forced between them felt almost cold.

But perhaps it was nothing. She couldn't entirely blame him either, after she had freaked out before. Maybe he was merely trying to give her breathing room, which was nice, but strangely unwelcome to her subconscious. Either way, she wasn't sure she liked the wall he had built, even if it _was_ intended for her comfort.

What if she didn't want him to pull away? How was she, an illiterate in the language of dating – or courting, as he preferred – supposed to communicate that to him?

"Yo!" She turned to face the new speaker and was thoroughly unsurprised by Beelebub's familiar face. "The cavalry has arrived!"

The demon looked as depraved as ever. Dressed solely in black and dark blue, his jeans were more rips than fabric and his hair looked as though it had been in a fight with a windstorm and an entire bottle of gel. Not that his chain-bedecked shirt was any better. In one hand he carried an apparently ancient leather guitar case and in the other a pair of drumsticks, which he slid into his jeans pocket with a flourish.

On his heels was a lovely full-figured blonde woman, her hair twisted into a pair of complicated knots, and a slim, small man with a shock of hair so pale a green that it couldn't possibly be real. They were both dressed in blue and black, and maneuvered a large, boxy instrument case through the hall while sending Azrael brief greeting as they passed.

"Just us tonight, right?" Azrael asked, still looking somewhat distracted.

"Yup," Beelzebub answered, hooking his fingers around his belt. "Everything will be set up in a minute. We can start whenever you're ready." He shot a golden, smoky wink in Lilith's direction, pairing it with a roguish full-body scan that made her duck her head shyly. "Hey there, princess. Lookin' tasty!"

She thanked him, grateful when he turned his bright eyes back to her guardian and quirked a silvery eyebrow. He must have realized that the angel was truly distracted if he wasn't telling Beelzebub to kindly keep a civil tongue in his head. "What's your problem?" the demon demanded. "You look like you've lost something."

Azrael let out a quiet breath and met the other man's eyes. "Have you seen Balael?"

"Hatter? No…why?" Surprise and curiosity rose at the edge of Beelzebub's voice.

"I made an arrangement with her. She's supposed to keep Lilith company while we play."

"Really?"

Lilith's eyes flew from angel to demon, following the shrug of Beelzebub's firmly muscled shoulders beneath the mutilated shirt. "She'll get here, then. She listens to you. I don't know why, but she does, which is saying something, 'cause she sure as hell won't listen to me."

He laughed then, silvery hair catching the red light streaming in from the open doorway and gleaming like blood-stained glass.

All of a sudden Azrael seemed to stiffen beside her, lifting his head to peer over his shoulder just as a thin white hand slid over the dark fabric of his jacket to grip him by the arm. A relaxed smile curved his lips. "And speak of the devil…"

But Lilith was no longer listening. She was staring, dumbstruck, at the human-shaped female that had materialized to the rear of her guardian. The woman's skin was paper-white, her lips and her eerily pale green eyes lined in black with liquid-like streaks slicing her cheek. The pinstriped fedora pulled low over her face didn't quite conceal side-swept bangs the color of garnets spun into silk thread and woven into hair that veiled her right eye.

Lilith recognized her immediately from the magazine cover in Beelzebub's office during her first trip to the Hall, the one depicting her guardian and the prince of hell as females. This was the curvy, bright-eyes woman who had stood in the middle; and _they_ were a band called EVE.

She looked like a cross between a mime and a china doll, her rounded face both unusually pretty and chillingly expressionless. There was a glittering edge to the eyes peering out from the darkness, and for a moment, Lilith contemplated being afraid until the strange woman cracked a brilliant smile and chirped cheerily: "_guten __abend!_"

"You are late," Azrael told her softly, quirking a single golden eyebrow down at the.

The woman stepped away from him, prancing about on feet that were enviably light in four-inch spike heeled boots and twirled to bend into a graceful bow directed their way. She swept the hat from her head, exposing chin-length hair that wasn't even a tiny bit mussed.

"_Es __tut __mir __leid!_" She made a face as she straightened up, plopping the hat back on her head and pulling the brim down over her eyes. "Unexpected check of disciplinary records held me up. But I've been a good girl, so I got through!"

"Hey, Hatter," Beelzebub hailed, reaching out and patting the top of the woman's hat while he addressed the angel, "Rocky, Israfel and I'll get started on the instruments. Meet us backstage, when you finish up here?"

"Sure," Azrael nodded, turning to Lilith as the prince disappeared into the red room. "Lilith, this is Balael," he gestured to the demon woman, whom, Lilith noticed, was just about the same height as herself. "She's a friend of mine, and is going to keep you company while we're occupied. Balael, this is Lilith."

The demon bent into another extravagant bow, quite a feat in the black and white striped corset that cinched her waist over her black tank shirt. Smiling to flash white teeth from between black-painted lips, Balael chirped, "_Freut __mich, __Sie __kennenzulernen!__"_

Ever patient, Azrael leaned toward the little demon and said, "_Auf __Englisch, __bitte__…_"

Balael's painted, doll-like face adopted an expression that was purely bashful. "Sorry, so used to _Deutsche!_" She smiled again and rephrased, "It's lovely to meet you, at last."

Lilith smiled back, if a little hesitantly. Despite the slightly frightening eccentricity of the demon's appearance, she managed to squeak, "likewise," and winced, afraid that she might have been offensive. But when she looked up, Balael was still smiling, black-painted lips curved gently with understanding.

"Don't worry, I don't bite!"

Azrael found this statement amusing, for he chuckled before speaking. "Keep a close eye on her, Bal. She has this strange magnetic attraction to danger."

Lilith glared at him. Though she knew he was mainly teasing her, he was also partially serious. But instead of addressing it, he merely shrugged off the reprimand in her eyes, reminding her again of his uncustomary distance.

"The only bad thing about coming to a place not ruled by the immortal is that no one here knows to keep their distance, and I cann't expect my mere presence to dissuade any mischief. Hence, why I summoned this little ball of trickiness and malcontent," he gestured to Balael with another of those dazzling, slightly wicked grins of his. "She knows how to scare off the big bad wolf."

"_Jawohl,_" Balael agreed, "the big bad wolf ain't got nothing on _me_. Rest assured, _Engel,_ I'll keep her safe." Then she paused, thoughtful for a moment, and inquired, her voice suddenly silky, "permission to use magic, if necessary?"

"Granted," the angel allowed graciously, "but only if _absolutely_ necessary. And do not forget, I will see if you use it." He touched the tips of two fingers to the corner of his eye, seeming to indicate the black lines tracing the lids – so very like those that seemed to drip down the demon's cheek. With that, Balael inclined her head and took a step backward in retreat to wait.

Azrael looked down at his human companion, his expression mildly apologetic. "I'm sorry to impose this on you. I just got the proposition to perform while you were changing, so there wasn't much warning, and I couldn't find anyone else free to protect you."

She decided not to comment on the issue of protection, mostly due to the fact that she had just remembered why they were there, and excitement began to bubble inside her chest. "I don't mind…are you _really_ going to _sing?__"_

The enthusiasm in her voice made him smile in a way that was more real than his previous had been, slow and relaxed. "I was never much of a vocalist. Piano and violin are my forte, but on occasion..." He carried her hand to his mouth and touched a gentle kiss to the edge of her palm, just beneath the thumb joint. The gentle touch of his lips was faint and delicate, his breath whisking across the momentarily exposed skin of her wrist.

"If you wish me to," he added softly, "then I will."

There was something in the tone of his words that made her pause, something which shifted the anticipation in her to another note. Something had changed and she could feel it. For a fleeting moment, she half expected him to sink his teeth into the veins at her wrist and drink her dry; which, of course, was ridiculous. He was an angel, not some twisted thing out of a stale vampire movie. He had no intention of harming her.

But even after he released her hand, let it fall back to her side with the imprint of his kiss still tingling against her skin, she couldn't deny the fact that there had been a hard, hungry gleam to his eyes just then. Something about the way his gaze followed the curve of her mouth and onward down her throat had suggested more than mere singing.

Then Balael was there, taking Lilith's arm and shooing him on with a light-hearted peal of laughter. "Off with you, then," she scolded gently, "don't hold them up!"

As soon as her contact with Azrael's eyes was broken, Lilith found she could breathe again, not realizing she'd been unable to before. The two immortals exchanged another word or two in German, and Balael was tugging her lightly toward the red room, murmuring, "Come on! If we hurry, we'll still get good seats!"

She looked back over her shoulder, watching Azrael offer her a, encouraging smile and a small wave. Reassured by the affectionate warmth she saw returned to his eyes, she returned the gesture just before she and her escort slid through the door into the red room, leaving him alone.

As soon as they were out of sight, Azrael dug the nails of one hand into the back of the other, clawing so deeply that blood began to well beneath the crescent-shaped grooves. The pain was sharp and clean, the scent of blood coppery and thick, but the combination of both served as necessary grounding.

He had been dangerously out of line just then, so very close to crossing that ever-thinning line that it caused him more shame than he cared to think about. Poor, unsuspecting girl; she had no idea what she did to him with her scent alone.

He cleared his head with a swift shake, ignoring the lingering aroma of violets and sternly refusing to give in to the desire to lick the flavor of her skin from his lips.

_Not __good._

He was wound tighter than a spring, and if he slipped, he ran the risk of hurting her beyond repair. Stress was a deadly enemy when housed in his body, and he realized now that the sooner he burned off this adrenaline driven by an overload of physical and mental pressure, the safer Lilith would be.

That was the very reason he had strayed away from her, throwing up a wall between her and his trembling self-control, to be certain that he wouldn't be tempted by the growing acceptance in her aura. He had overestimated his ability to withstand the allure of touching her. It had seemed manageable even after her the way she had melted into his arms in the studio, even after tonight, when she had relinquished yet another fragment of control to him.

But his discipline had not quite prepared him for how lovely she was with her hair coiled so prettily over the draping neckline of the blouse, or the delicate, feminine click of her shoes. Heels – the ultimate man-made tactic to ensure an unpracticed woman couldn't flee.

Hence, the reason he had refrained from touch as much as he could reasonably afford; enough to avoid the very real desire he had to haul her over his shoulder and carry her back to her home, and the bed that resided within. He simply couldn't risk her losing any respect she might have had for him through a moment of weakness.

Calmed by the distance between himself and his charge, he tread the dark-lit paths leading to the back stage area with the brooding silence of a lone wolf. But a soft smile lifted the corner of Azrael's mouth as he recalled Lilith's open acceptance of the strange people being shoved into her company. Because Balael was quite strange when one considered the girls Lilith considered friends.

There were those of his kind who would have questioned his decision to involve the demon mother of wrath with the protection of his ward. But that was only because Balael was volatile, crafty, and fickle with her loyalties. She respected Azrael, even though he had been charged with casting her from the heavens during the Rebellion; allowing her to keep one of her wings and treating her with compassion.

Many called her a turncoat, a double-crosser, the ultimate double-agent; but in reality, Balael had just been a little madder than the proverbial hatter since her trip to Hell. She liked to play and meddle. Yet within that very double-edged madness driven by a mixture of loyalty and betrayal was the reason Azrael knew he could be certain that she would keep Lilith safe.

Besides, at the moment, she was a far safer guardian for his little human charge than he was. She would serve as a buffer and allow him to work off some of his excess adrenaline.

It had been a long time since the group known to the mortal underground as EVE had made an appearance. They were renowned as a gang of musicians who conducted themselves in the style of old-world troubadours, playing only live shows, no recordings, no covers, no autographs, and allowing only the barest threads of publicity for a legacy of constantly changing young people. The group had been performing for decades, for no founded reason other than that it was enjoyable…and an amazing outlet for strain.

Rumor that EVE would be making an appearance spread by word of mouth alone had fleshed out the crowd anticipating entry.

He passed beneath the striped shadows of the catwalks, the great iron trellises black against gray brick walls and ceiling, stepping through one of the closed doors labeled; _Stage __B._ Beelzebub and Rocky were already almost finished setting up the instruments according to their liking. The fourth EVE performer, with his hair a green a soft, muted shade like cotton candy, was shifting an amplifier farther from the wings to better the sound that would be given off. Israfel was the patron and guardian angel of musicians, artists, and poets.

Azrael shed his jacket and approaching the cordless microphone positioned at the front and center of the stage, concealed, for the time being, by the heavy blue velvet curtain.

What he had told Lilith was true; he didn't usually favor vocals, preferring to man keys, piano or even percussion over using his voice, but it was his turn. Hopefully it would wear him out enough to rid him of the energies riding his shoulders like a ghost and calm those suppressed urges, both innocent and not. The restlessness coiling into excitement was far too feverish for comfort, and he relished the prospect of bleeding it out with music.

The mic was cold to his touch, but the chill faded under the heat that seeped from his warmth-flushed skin as he lifted it from the stand to give himself plenty of mobility. He didn't like to be penned in one place when it was his voice on the line; especially when he knew Lilith would be watching. The thought of her wide green eyes on him made his blood heat almost against his conscious will, yet he didn't try to squash it beneath any restrictive moral obligations. Not now that she was safe and many yards away.

Passion could be a tool just as it was a sensation. Anyone who channeled it properly could access strength they didn't know could be possible, and what more appropriate a moment to need a boost of extra fortitude?

He knew his ward did not yet know what to think of this new, less-than-genteel side to him, and he really didn't blame her. The only facet of personality he had shown her was tidy and collected; the aloof, the watchful, and the guarded gentleman.

Of course, she had known there were other facets to him already; she was no simpleton, and was bound to have noticed when his demeanor shifted from cultured to primitive. After all, he was not human. It was risky to expose this part of him that was not as mild-mannered as what she had seen before, but if there were complications Balael knew what to do. It was another part of why he had asked her and not one of his fellow angels.

Because no one knew his inner beast quite like Balael did.


	24. Whispers in the Dark

**Chapter 27  
**Whispers in the Dark

Recommended Listening: "Lips Like Morphine" by Kill Hannah,  
"Whispers in the Dark" and "Yours to Hold" by Skillet

* * *

The show room was lit with a dull, ruby red tone that made the brick and industrial metal interior look as though it had been permanently tinted. Scarlet upholstery and thousands of tiny candle lights in glass cylinders offered a deceivingly romantic flicker, creating an atmosphere that held a smoky iridescence from burning wicks.

And people were everywhere; squashed unceremoniously and uncaringly together. Closer than even the modern age's loosely warped society standards would have allowed, from the door all the way to the stage, piling along the narrow spiral stairwell leading up to the viewing balcony above. There were too many bodies to make the venture inside entirely comfortable. Lilith was buffeted and shoved at from all angles, with nothing but the almost oddly stable support of the demon to her left to keep her from being carried away into the mass.

Except that she could barely focus on what was going on around her due to the sheer level of her excitement. Her prim, proper guardian – whom she could honestly have imagined deeming it poor manners to lift his voice in public – was going to _sing_. With a voice that could have charmed the most suspicious, protective, hard-hearted bird from its nest while doing nothing but extending salutations, she could only imagine what it would be like to hear it spun into song.

There was a distinct lightness to her step as she followed her chaperone, adrenaline mixing with the feverish pitch of the sounds and lights and the wash of activity. An enthusiasm she didn't attempt to conceal.

Balael navigated around the greater part of the mob with an ease that Lilith found astounding. She dodged and weaved and shoved her way along, mirroring the bobbing rhythm of the crowd swaying to the music that blared through the speakers and rattled the walls. There was an undertone of uncaring to the little female that said she had been places much louder and rougher in her time, and that gave Lilith some comfort.

The demon woman carried herself with the easy confidence that her human companion so envied in other women. From the way she moved, to the way she deflected the reach of a drunken patron's hands by snapping her teeth in his direction; and laughing maniacally when he pulled hurriedly away. Everything about her was utterly fearless.

And probably with good reason; who knew what she was capable of underneath that painted china-doll face and underground Gothic attire.

They ascended a shallow set of stairs that led them out of the pit of dancers and to a raised platform. It formed a secondary sub-floor level home to a group of tables overlooking the stage and backed by the bar, one of which Balael claimed by sliding into one of the lushly cushioned seats.

Illumination came from three huge house spotlights wired to the catwalks that detailed the entire interior ceiling like a sprawling metal skeleton, harsh and yellow. They were only at half their potential brilliancy, but the contrast they made to the rest of the club made Lilith's eyes water as she took her own seat with a little less grace and Balael angled herself toward the bar.

One of the waiters there took one look at the demoness' raised, paper-white hand and lurched forward as though compelled by more than the hope of a good tip.

"Bourbon Triple Sour, if your please," she cooed, offering a sweet smile, her eyes flirtatious beneath her long black lashes as she deposited her hat upon the little table's surface. Something in that smile was just a little too attentive, her soft inhale just a little too bright with, that whispered of manic hungers at home in places far darker than this.

With a decidedly dazed look on his face, the boy nodded and Balael turned to Lilith with a grin that was abruptly quite cheerful to ask, "Anything for you?"

"No, thank you," the mortal girl replied politely. "I don't drink."

"Probably smart," the demon admitted with a wink of one chartreuse eye for the waiter, who rushed off for her drink. He returned in less time than it would have taken a retriever to fetch a duck from a yard away, and gave her the wide-rimmed glass as though presenting jewels to a queen.

Lilith watched with some embarrassment while Balael thanked him, wondering what it was about a woman with the look of an eclectic mix of French-gothic mime and burlesque dancer that had put such a look of enthrallment on the waiter's face. No one looked like that for a woman who wasn't built like a first-rate model with legs a mile long and hips that could fit in size one jeans.

She wondered what the secret was; the presence, the self-esteem, or because an immortal simply couldn't go ignored? Either way, it was both fascinating and covetable.

Dismissed by a charming wave of an arm gloved in mesh and stripes, the waiter left, and Balael was chirping happily; "Ooh, I'm excited—we haven't heard Azrael play in almost twenty years!" When Lilith remained confusedly quiet, the demon woman's eyes flickered toward her, cool and pale as chips of some icy green gem. "Did he tell you he hasn't been performing lately?"

"Oh—no," Lilith hurried to answer, chagrined to have been caught with her thoughts elsewhere, and disconcerted by the demon's uncomfortably studious stare; a look made especially unsteadying by the harsh sideways tilt to her head. It didn't make sense for Azrael to spill everything about his life to her. He had lived for so long, there was sure to be a lot of ground to cover and she had only really known him for a few weeks, so she answered with the truth.

"I didn't even know he sang until tonight. But it's just music. No big deal—"

"_Ach_—typical _man_," Balael giggled, and Lilith was startled by how charming the sound was, how morbidly adorable it made her seem. "Trying to protect his ego by neglecting to share his weaknesses with you…probably a self-defense tactic."

The mention of the infamous pride of men caused Lilith's brow to furrow, but Balael was already explaining with an emphatic use of hands.

"For the longest time he used to run around earth pretending to be an artisan so he could have an excuse to play or paint or what have you. It was an escape from things like loneliness, anger, or frustration." Suddenly she looked thoroughly exasperated, the expression exaggerated by her wide, pale eyes. "He's always been sensitive about it—as if it makes him less of a man to like music and art!"

How could Azrael be unsettled in his own skin? He always seemed so balanced and composed; just by looking at him, at the way he conducted himself, it was hardly possible to believe such a thing could be true, and Lilith said as much.

"You mean he's insecure?" she began, fussing with the buttons of her jacket, "Because I never would have thought that was possible."

"_Nein,_" Balael sighed. "He…regrets that he should have to use creative energy as an outlet for strong emotion. He thinks it makes him weak."

Objection filled her throat so fast that Lilith thought she might choke on it. "But _why?_ Everyone needs emotional support, sometimes."

The demon's painted lips twisted into something that was not a smile, but the bared grin of a creature just bordered on a touch of airy, insubstantial bitterness. "_Humans_ do," Balael corrected. "Not angels. They feel, but not to the point of _needing_it so…" Here she paused, tapping her fingernails against her glass before she finished with a delicacy that seemed almost provocative. "…desperately."

Balael signaled for the waiter and Lilith found her thoughts wandering to the moment in the hallway, during which Azrael's eyes had caught and held hers as though he had gripped her by something that extended deeper than the soul. The way she had been unable to breathe, unable to think or speak or move out of terror that it might break that beguiling contact.

Her eyes flickered to the side, where Balael was speaking in hushed tones to the human boy who eyed her with a mixture of intrigue and blatant wanting that would have been embarrassing to witness in any other circumstance. Because she had just realized that Azrael had looked at _her_ in a way that much resembled that of the boy's. Only his had echoed the darker, more predatory interest that might resemblea hungry wolf's face before she had left him. No…before _Balael_ had urged her away.

The boy set a fresh drink in front of the demon woman and trailed away as though he wished he didn't have to go, and Balael was adding to the subject of emotional support.

"He's been so distracted by other things that he hasn't had the time to mope about it." She took a sip from her drink and gave a blissful little shiver. "After he found you, he avoided the group—partly because he doesn't want that dependence to take away from his time with you and partly because he doesn't want to look incapable of guarding you. But the stress he's been under probably just got to be too much."

Her laughter was twinkling and delightful. "And here we are!" She chirped, "Relieving stress."

Lilith frowned, adjusting the lay of her sequined blouse across her stomach. She didn't like to think it had been her fault that her guardian had wound himself up into such tension without allowing enough time to seek relief, even if it had been unintentional.

How could he think it was weak to be attached to things like music and beauty? An escape from pressure was something she understood all to well, something she could relate to. It showed sensitivity and heart, depth of spirit and a tender soul; attributes that she knew were weaving her connection to him with a strength was becoming formidable. Attributes that _he_ wanted to hide.

"How do you know all this?" she asked the demon, both curious and somewhat wary.

That was when she realized the entire room had gone almost completely quiet, encompassed by a hush that was unnervingly heavy. Her eyes wandered, searching for the reason, darting across dense crowds of people who stared with rapt attention toward the stage as the house lights grew dim.

Balael inclined her head, garnet bangs veiling almost half of her face as the curtain was slowly unveiled to expose the performers to the audience waiting with bated breath. "Because he was my lord and master once. I was the Angel of Penitence—the very first of his Crows. And I was the first sinner the Angel of Death threw to hell with his own hands."

Lilith's green eyes flashed toward the demon, torn between feelings of sympathy and aversion, confusion and curiosity that had no place to settle. But any hope of continuing the conversation was drowned in the rolling crescendo of noise which rose from the fans cramming the floor, the balconies, and the stairwell. Their raging adoration created an impassioned greeting for the four figures positioned on the stage.

Spotlights flared to highlight the musicians adorned in black and blue as notes were twisted from the strings of an electric guitar and the harmony of a keyboard; an unearthly tempo brought center by the beat of percussion.

As though she had been lassoed, Lilith found her mind fixed and centered to a single point upon that stage.

White lids slid open, violet eyes capturing the soft blue lighting that shone down upon them like the breath of heaven. Lilith's words were lost, not only within the sounds of the melody but within her own throat, choked by her shock as she stared up at the man whose lips parted to fill the air with song that seemed to sink into her very blood.

It simply wasn't natural; no music had ever made her feel like this. But his _voice_…it was just so beautiful, the perfect compromise between melodic and dark. At first it was lilting and sweet to coax out the affection in the heart, then cut it down with the sharp edge given to it by the drum-strokes and the slide of the Beelzebub's guitar.

It was like nothing she had ever heard before, this music, this magic in the form of sound. It caused goose bumps across her skin and the tiny hairs at the nape of her neck to stand on end. She dragged air into her lungs with a hard gasp. Heat pooled at the pit of her stomach, a needy itch spread across her skin, the blood in her veins flushed with anticipation so like the kind that came with a kiss.

He threw back his head, all pale gold and ivory throat, crooning a single, lingering note that seemed to reflect the shimmer of the light upon his face. And it was as though he were right there, his hands on her skin and his lips against the curve of her throat, teasing away the resistance of her better judgment to bend her, pleading, into submission, stripping away whatever protection she had left. Using nothing more than his voice, it was as though he could touch the deepest, most sensitive places inside her.

She had to fight to breathe.

No _wonder_ the line outside had been so anxious to get in; the sound was like heroin for the ears. How _dare_ he think himself weak for being able to do this!

Balael's hand gripped her shoulder, pulling her roughly from the melting, caramel trance and forcing her to look away. "_Breathe._ Don't let him drag you under so fast or you might pass out." Though her tone was alight with whimsy, Lilith had the distinct impression the remark had been quite serious.

She shook her head, slowly, unable to quite rid herself of the daze from the haunting music. "Wh-_what_ is he _doing_ to me?" She croaked, suddenly parched with thirst. As though it had been anticipated, Balael slid a glass of water toward her, which she snatched immediately, gulping nearly the entire thing before she calmed enough to speak again. "How is this _weakness?__"_

Balael patted her trembling hand sympathetically, but the look on her painted face was almost gleeful. "It's his glamour. He has that affect on most humans, but he won't admit it because he's stubborn."

Lilith chanced a glance back at the stage, then looked hurriedly away when her stomach lurched with something she didn't _want_ to analyze properly. She wrapped her arms around herself in an attempt to abate the chills racing through her nerves, even though the cloth of her jacket felt stifling across her back and shoulders. "What is it that makes him so—so…"

"Addictive?" The demon suggested slyly. "That hypnotic, seductive allure that seems like it came out of a vampire story? That would be the immortality. We all have that allure. His is so strong because he has the ability to focus it, use it manipulate things—or the people around him_._"

Balael's voice had adopted a sing-song tone that mirrored the melody at the background, and Lilith felt the muscles in her arms and legs spasm impulsively, as though she wanted to rise from her chair and go to the stage where he waited.

Lilith turned her head toward the stage, following Azrael's surefooted steps as he maneuvered across the front of the stage with a graceful ease. With his empty hand he reached out to touch the straining fingers of the audience. Relating to the crowd; hearing them, entreating them, as though each one of them was dear to his heart. All the while, however, his twilit eyes seemed to broach the distance between them and wrap her in something hot, thick, and chillingly alive.

Forcing her head away, she took a deep, slow breath and swallowed another mouthful of water that was cool on her tongue.

"Interesting," Balael mused, peering between angel and human girl with a measure of delighted surprise. "He's mixing magic with his voice to make it affect you specifically—targeting you. He doesn't usually play so dirty." Her eyes suddenly darkened, narrowing slightly to slits that held a severity that seemed odd in her face. "Good thing I'm here…"

With those words to aide her Lilith realized that the during the incident in the hall, Balael had inserted herself between human and angel, as though the demon woman had been protecting Lilith from her own guardian.

Green eyes uncertain, she glanced at Azrael, still so elegant in his mastery of the space around him. He seemed completely calm now, collected and controlled, but she remembered the molten spark that had lit his eyes before Balael had shooed him on. She had thought it was just the adrenaline, but now she wasn't so certain. There had been an echo that hadn't been the least bit innocent, and hadn't even bothered pretending to be.

She knew she had to ask, no matter what the answer turned out to be.

"Before…why did you pull me away from him?"

Balael's smile was pitying, her reply coming just as the first song came to a close and applause deafened the wide room with noise. Yet Lilith listened intently, not daring to miss something which felt so vital, and found that somehow she was able to block the sound of her guardian's voice almost completely from her consciousness. Her hands still shook from the effect, but he seemed to have retreated enough to allow her some freedom to catch her breath.

The demon's words were hushed to prevent any human from overhearing, not that anyone was bound to be listening. There was little contest for them between some idle chatter and the voice of an angel.

"To every angel there is a tiny bit of a demon, buried deep inside the soul," she explained. "They're not just with sugar and spice and everything nice. Angels have their passions, otherwise they wouldn't feel. He's under a lot of pressure right now, and with every bit of stress, every strong emotion, he strays a little farther from his manners."

Balael raised her cat-like eyes to Lilith's, her doll-like face eerily pale in the blue-violet lighting. "The only reason you're still a virgin right now is because he has a self-control of _steel,__" _she whispered, every word thick with suggestion, a hint of delight in the slow curve of her painted smile and the trace of her tongue along one sharp canine tooth. "But even the strongest shields can slip. I'd bet my own eyes that if I hadn't been here, he would've had you in some nice private room in less than ten seconds flat."

Suddenly Lilith understood.

The place where Azrael had kissed her burned against her skin, her wrist throbbing with the heat, the imprint left by his lips like the mark of an invisible brand in her flesh. Could he—would he have done something like that?

Despite the initial trill of alarm that alit in her chest she couldn't imagine it, simply couldn't envision him forcing her into anything. Not of she didn't want him to.

Perhaps Balael could see her working up the effort to protest, because before she could open her mouth, the demon woman touched a small white hand to her arm and spoke with another strange note of mirthless severity. "It's none of my business, but if you're not ready, avoid touching him if you can. I don't know how much more temptation he can stand…he needs you so badly, instinct and desire can bury good intentions even as strong as his."

A shrug arched Balael's bare shoulders. "_Ich __weiß __nicht. _Just a suggestion."

Rubbing her still throbbing wrist with trembling fingers, Lilith looked back up at the stage, tuning her ears back to the melody that twined from her guardian's throat like a whispered longing forged with warmth and suggestive shadows, silk ribbons and candlelight.

He had always acted to keep her safe, to make sure she felt comfortable and secure. From healing her bruised, battered body and replacing an unwanted dance partner to fending off fits of anxiety with patience and encouragement.

Since their last choreography session, when she had found herself reveling in that touch she was being warned away from, she had felt closer to him than she'd thought was possible. She had secretly yearned for that intimacy, the warmth and the feeling of being sheltered; and when he had seemed to be pulling away from her, she had felt a whole new kind of fear.

But perhaps that closeness was the very source of the problem. Because would she, if given another chance, let him finish what she started?

Misery: that's what she was giving him. And she hurt him so badly that he might forget everything dear to him because she was nothing less than a walking, talking torment. What a horrible, selfish girl she was to do this to the man who had guarded her so selflessly.

She tore her eyes from the stage, unable to look at him now, weak with dread and self-loathing, staring instead at the table, studying the patterns of water-stains on the treated wood. How she would be able to face Azrael again now that she knew these things, she wasn't sure. It took a bit of work to will away the lurch in her abdomen which felt uncomfortably like a sob.

"But he loves you," Balael chirped then, swinging so rapidly from one mood to another that it was almost dizzying, lifting her glass to consume the last of the bourbon. "Which seems enough to forgive all sorts of sins!"

It might have seemed too flippant a remark to offer any real comfort, but Lilith found enough there to muster a smile.

Tipsy from drinks, the young man passed by on route to the bar connected solidly with their table, knocking Balael's hat to the floor. With an air of someone receiving a new puppy, the demon rose from her seat to punch the human man squarely in the face, issuing joyfully vicious insults to the offender to the honor of her hat.

Lilith scooped the fedora from the floor and, after dusting the dirt from its brim, set it carefully back into place, politely ignoring the noise of the happy brawl.

The second song had come to a close, which she noticed with thanks to the ear-splitting noise of the fans. One zealous woman even shrieked a proposal of marriage from her place in the mosh pit; a request met by howls of both laughter and encouragement.

Azrael seemed to find it humorous as well, for when the applause died down he said calmly into the mic; "I'm sorry, I'm no longer the eligible bachelor of the band. You'll have to talk to Balthazar about that." A wild-haired Beelzebub retaliated with a saucy wink, wiggling his fingers in a saucy wave for the audience. Azrael's soft, luscious laughter was magnified to a pitch that was inhumanly devastating.

"All right, then," the angel mused, taking a step backward and conferring with the blond woman on keys as he raked the white-blond hair back from his forehead. "Last one for tonight—"

There was a loud murmur of disappointment and protest, the crowd clearly loathe for their time with the legendary EVE to be called so short.

Azrael lifted a hand to call for quiet, his smile apologetic and placating. "I'm sorry, but I'm out of practice! I need to save my voice so my wife won't force me to eat half a bag of cough drops. Do you know how _disgusting_ those things are?"

Lilith's cheeks reddened, knowing perfectly well who this _wife _he mentioned truly was. The mixture of ridiculous pleasure and terror fizzled between her ribs with the ferocity of a freshly lit Sparkler.

Laughter replaced the pleas of the audience upon sight of Azrael's faintly pained look, lightening the mood of the room.

He waved a fine, white hand and made certain they knew what a fantastic audience they had been, how much he and his comrades had enjoyed playing for them, and thanked them.

The last song began with a soft trill from Beelzebub's guitar, and immediately she noticed the difference in the sound. It wasn't as hard, heavy or dark in rhythm as the others had been, but soft, with lyrics that swept tears into her eyes.

Azrael's voice was husky and smooth, a gentle, thrumming purr that rippled through the air, a fantasy made real. She could feel it this time, the touch of his magical focus on her, persuading her to close her eyes and surrender. Like the stroke of gentle fingertips, the soft touch traced her arm, her cheek, trailing down the side of her neck and falling away to leave her aching with a sweet, desperate kind of sorrow.

He dragged the feeling from her, pulling delicately at her heartstrings, touching a place so deep that she knew she would never be able to run from him. She knew that part of it was his spell, but she also knew that there were some things magic simply couldn't imitate or create.

A tear slid down her cheek, leaving a warm, salty trail that followed the curve of her face so perfectly that it might have been the touch of his fingertip. She almost wished it was, wished that she could reach out and slip her arms around his waist, rest her head against his chest and feel the beat of his heart.

The phantomlike echo of his hand touched her shoulder, fingers feathering along her jaw in a tender examination, silently inquiring as to whether she was safe and well. At that point, there was nothing in the world that would make her believe that he could hurt her. She didn't care if he wanted her body; he loved her more than she had a right to know. And that was a beautiful thing.

She heard Balael plop back down into the seat beside her, cracking the knuckles of her right hand and grinning from ear to ear. "That was fun!" she chimed happily, then paused upon catching sight of the glistening line traced down mortal girl's cheek, her concern palpable in the fretful way she half-reached for her mortal companion.

Feeling the silent concern, Lilith summoned a shaky smile and swiped at her eyes, mumbling, "is it stupid of me to be jealous of a microphone?"

Balael glanced toward the stage, taking in the proximity between Azrael's soft white lips and the cold metal of the magnifier. "Not at all, _Süße,_" she replied in her chirping, sing-song way of hers. "Not at _all._"


	25. East of Desire

**Chapter 28  
**East of Desire

Recommended Listening: "Sweet Misery" by Tiesto  
and "Dark as Love" by Luscious Redhead

* * *

"You lied to me."

His eyes were shocked when he looked at her, appalled by the dry accusation in her voice. The dark lines of kohl circling the white lids were a liquid emphasis drawing her attention directly to the narrow black pupils at the center of two suddenly very pale irises. "I did not!" He denied forcefully, threads of hurt evident behind the sound as he stopped dead mid-stride.

She stopped a solid beat after he had and glanced back at him, trying to hide a smile while he visibly raked his brain for some hint of what he possibly could have lied to her about.

He never told untruths, it went against his moral code, _especially_ when conversing with _her._ Shield the truth – yes. Not speak it – when he had to. But he would never have _lied. _Puzzled, distressed, he questioned cautiously; "about what?"

Feeling bad for having teased him, Lilith retraced her steps and reassumed her place at his side, tucking her arm around his so they joined at the elbows. His body was warm despite the decisively chilly weather and the relatively thin jacket, as though he simply radiated his own heat. And that was quite a welcome thing on a night such as this one.

"Your singing," she answered, her smile a little bashful, "You said you weren't very good." Blushing when she found the smooth, cool skin of his hand beneath her fingertips, her eyes lowered to the cement beneath her toes. "You're a very good singer."

"Oh," he sighed, calmed by the explanation, "that." In another breath, he was anxious again, peering down at the top of her head, a question on his lips; the classic concern of a performer hungered for feedback. "Did it please you?"

For a moment she hesitated, unsure whether or not the reply she had would be received without scorn, but as he always encouraged her to be brave and to trust him, she decided it was better to be honest about how she felt. While her expression was just a little on the shrewd side when she looked at him, she was proud of how mild and empty to judgment her voice was.

"Did I have a choice?" she asked lightly, "Balael explained about the magic."

Azrael winced, then became so utterly expressionless so quickly that it was frightening. The flesh beneath Lilith's palm clenched when his powerful hand curled into a fist. "I will _murder _her—"

Alarmed, Lilith unconsciously grasped his arm so he couldn't stalk back toward the club where the demonic entourage had decided to stay for a few more hours. He wasn't pulling at her yet, but she dug her heels into the cement anyway, determined not to let his strength catch her off guard if he decided to.

"No, no! It's ok, really!" When he didn't answer, her insistence turned to pleading. "She was only trying to answer my questions. She helped me!"

She renewed her grip upon her guardian's forearm, the muscle beneath fabric and flesh clasped to her chest, watching him carefully for the flash of red in the eyes that would signal his anger. They were still quite pale, but she knew how to recognize the warning signs of temper in him.

But despite her certainty that temper would be the result of her comment, it never rose. He used his free hand to pat her white-knuckled hands in a way that was gently reassuring, but almost awkwardly formal. "I'm not going to hurt her," he soothed. "I've no quarrel with Balael. But I do wish she'd kept her mouth shut."

"Why?" She asked; her grip about his arm relaxing beneath genuine curiosity. Why did he seem so defensive and shielded?

"It's embarrassing that you—I feel a little like a child caught doing something bad." His smile was slightly crooked, a wry twist of ivory lips that melded quite sweetly with the husky melody of his voice.

_Oh,_ how she could learn to worship that voice.

"I hope you can forgive me for…tampering. I wouldn't have done so had I been in a more stable state of mind," his eyes narrowed, "which is no excuse, but it's all I have."

A little belatedly she realized that his displeasure was not directed toward Balael because the demoness had shared knowledge of his immortal magic, but because her knowing shamed him. Perhaps that was because he thought she would be angry with him for having done it. Which she had to admit seemed like a reaction she would have had not so long ago.

It was another weakness she had been exposed to, that he wouldn't have mentioned out of choice. But it was one thing to hear him admit that her presence made it difficult to withstand temptation, and something entirely different to see such profound, undeniable evidence. And she knew simply from acclimating to the cultural and personal values he upheld in everything from conversation to motion, such a lapse in control was borderline unforgivable not only to himself, but to her sense of propriety.

If anything left of it remained.

While it was true, her bones still seemed to vibrate with every touch of his voice, a lingering aftereffect of being spelled no doubt, and a lightheadedness had overtaken her greater sense of balance; she didn't feel like resenting him. It didn't seem to matter that he had manipulated her. It had felt _good._

"It's all right," she repeated softly, seeking to reassure him as he had done for her only a few hours before. "It was interesting."

He regarded her with curiosity and she felt her cheeks redden, blushing so profusely that she was certain he could see it through the dusk. "Interesting?" He copied her as though tasting the word for the very first time, listening carefully to the sounds that fell from his tongue. "I think that's the first time I have heard it described with so lenient a word."

A sudden dismay overtook her. What did that mean; that he had used that spell before? She supposed this shouldn't have surprised her, but for some reason it made her feel insignificant and more than slightly jealous. Because there was no way she wanted to think about Azrael using that kind of magic on another woman.

She scrambled for footing, trying to dredge up some offhand remark to offer reassurance that she hadn't meant her comment to be an insult, that she hadn't meant anything but gentle teasing. But no words came. She just stood there, floundering, unable to conjure anything other than a useless apology repeated like a mantra; over and over and over in her mind.

"I didn't offend you?"

Bewildered, Lilith lifted her face back to his. "No," she spluttered, her shock as plain as paint. "Why would I be offended?"

She was stunned when he ducked his head, a gesture thick with disgrace, but listened in silence when he answered haltingly; "because sometimes my magic causes feeling that doesn't truly exist—emotions that aren't real. I've been loose-handed with it in the past, undisciplined, unrestrained, unintentionally drawing the love of humans who would normally steer away from the untouchable element to immortality."

His sigh was heavy in the night air, his eyes locked on some far-off time or place she couldn't and wouldn't see. Sorrow and remorse were as lovely as any other of his emotions and yet it made her ache to witness it, for whatever else she may have intended by bringing up the issue, it hadn't been to cause him pain.

"It's difficult to control that part of my nature. With strong emotion I can do terrible things—make people do things they wouldn't under their own will. But I didn't wish this for you…to cause you fear or unnecessary feeling."

She didn't mean to pry, but she was awfully curious. Surely it couldn't be all that bad, to experience that magnetic allure, no matter what one's original thoughts might be. "What do you mean? What kind of terrible things?"

"Do you know what happens when a human body experiences heightened levels of physical pleasure?"

He asked with such an illustrious smoothness that it almost hid the deadly enticement masked inside the question. At first she didn't know what to say, unsure whether he was trying to use irony or whether he was serious, but ultimately she was forced to consider his words.

Cheeks pink, she nodded obediently by way of response, finding it too awkward to actually answer with any spoken parallel to sex; let alone the forbidden O-word. Graciously, he neglected to address her embarrassment and continued.

"When humans seek this, they normally do so with some intentional desire for it, thus, automatically, there is some semblance of control. But imagine having that control stripped away, powerless to do anything while your body goes to pieces against every conceivable physical law without even a real touch to cause it." He made a noise deep in the back of his throat, hard with disgust. "That is what I've done—what I've caused with undirected magic no different from the spell I used on you, against my direct knowledge and purpose."

Her eyes widened, astounded and alarmed by what he had just told her. Was he actually saying that he had inadvertently sent unsuspecting people into full-blown sexual feeling because of an acceleration of emotion-charged magic? That was a hell of a lot of power to have, enough to liken him to a fertility god, like Dionysus or Eros, not one with mastery of death and compassion for the dying.

But_he_ was the one who advocated for the good and healing properties of sex, so why did he make it sound so awful? Sure, it was a little odd and probably somewhat mortifying for the people involved to realize they had undergone an orgasm without any logical reason but for some archaic attraction to a strange but beautiful man. But where was the real harm in that, when beloved religious stories had been based on far more horrible and hurtful things?

"It's not your fault," she murmured. It was fueled by hardly more than a breath, yet she knew he heard. "You said so yourself, you had no control over it. It's not like you used it maliciously, or with the intent to hurt anyone."

"Perhaps," he mused, though the sound was bitter to her ears. "But I take no pleasure in having virtually raped who knows how many innocent people."

Strangely enough, she felt laughter rolling from her throat, and shoved him gently with her shoulder. "Yeah, right! If what you did to them felt anything like what you did to me, I don't think there were any complaints." He quirked an eyebrow at her, looking both amused and sardonically surprised by this. She met his eyes, saw the uncertain hint of worry within them, and couldn't understand why he seemed so disturbed.

"What?" she demanded, automatically guarded.

Shaking his head, he replied quietly, "nothing. I just expected you to agree with me." When she gave him nothing more than a blank look, he smiled stiffly and added, "I know how you feel about such intimate matters."

"Hey," she defended sternly, even when inside she wanted to hide her face from his penetrating gaze, and from the truth of the fact that she had just partially admitted to favoring something with ties to sexuality. Still she denied, "that's different."

"Hardly," his inflection was bone dry. "That spell was designed specifically to spark desire and target the most sensitive parts of the human body—to make the blood heat and the nerves weaken."

His eyes were suddenly so very dark, blooming with a color and tint that bordered on the edge of pride and a fierce, unrestrained delight that made her knees feel as though they were melting inside her jeans.

"Judging by the way your scent thickened back in that room, it seemed to work," he added softly, "I could have forced you to your knees with barely any effort and you would have yielded." He stopped then, recognizing the wideness of her eyes, watching the shock of her realization that every word he spoke was true, and reached out, his fingers brushing the curve of her cheek as if to comfort her. "But you would have hated me for it."

He spoke about his powers of unconscious compulsion as though they were a crime, some unholy thing that deserved to be chastised and punished. Maybe a week ago she would have agreed with him. Maybe a few days ago she would have found it as disgusting and lewd as he seemed to think she did, or should. But now?

Did she feel violated or dirtied? Had she felt the hypnotic caress of the melodies fabricated from the sound of his songs were something to be despised? No, she didn't. Would she _really_ have hated him for subjecting her to the hot, melting feeling that had soaked into her bones, the delicate, decadent stroke to skin that seemed to flame in time to the rise and fall of his voice? Just his _voice?_

Perhaps she might have; but only because the hands that had touched her so sweetly had been no more than the breath of a ghost. If she was going to fall apart like that, she wanted it to be because of _him,_ not because of some spell.

"I wouldn't hate you," she said, unconsciously leaning into the touch of his hand, his skin a marble coolness against her face.

The laughter was hard and sharp with disbelief, making her cringe beneath the lash. "I truly think you would," he answered, just barely managing to keep the vapid despair out of his voice. But the effort to conceal it replaced his emotion with an icy pallor that made her wish she hadn't brought the subject up.

"No," she insisted, determined not to let that causeless anguish remain so unchallenged, "I wouldn't."

His eyes were unexpectedly icy and dispassionate when he took hold of her shoulders and pushed her firmly toward the mouth of the side-street nearby, his strength guiding her backward to the seclusion of the unlit niche. She stumbled slightly, but that was more because her feet were cold rather than his force.

Her shoulder blades hit the side of the old brick building, the tightly woven cloth of her blazer catching at the rough-cut stone. The impact was dulled by her confusion, yet while the narrow alley was shrouded in shadows she could see clearly enough to see him stalk toward her. He stood so close that she was held trapped between the dirty brick of the wall and the hard plains of his body. Such a predatory, possessive stance…she cowered for no other reason than the harsh streak of delight she felt from such adamant attention.

"You only think you wouldn't," he whispered, his lips at her ear, his breath hot and damp against her skin, "because, for the moment, it feels good."

The front of his powerful body crushed her backward into the wall, powerful hands grasping her around the waist to lift her from the ground as though she weighed nothing at all, bracing her to the solid surface until every vertebrae seemed melded with the imperfections there. Striking swiftly, he went straight for where it hurt the most by pinning her tight to the brick and pressing his hips into the cradle of hers.

She couldn't quite swallow the noise of sweet distress that slid from her throat when he did this, set free from the iron bind of luscious, liquid despair. She was scalded by the sudden heat that had spread across his skin, invoking a glorious fire that engulfed the fading ache in her bones with a searing vengeance. It was bliss, an agony so close to beauty that it had no name. Her fingers curled into his collar, her legs curling around his thighs, stricken by the need to be nearer to his perfect flesh.

His mouth closed upon her earlobe, nipping gently with sharp white teeth before replacing the touch with his tongue; taunting her, and begging forgiveness for doing so. "It feels good to me too—the longing in your voice and on your breath, the desire in your blood, knowing that I could make you burn the way I have burned for you night after night…"

"Please—" It was more whimper than anything else, the sound of it shivered with the hum of wanting that seemed to be slowly consuming her as a flame would consume a shred of paper.

These were not a phantom's hands cupping her bottom, pressing her tightly to something that brought her the most delicious kind of pain. Nor was it a ghost's mouth that trailed wet, sensual, open-mouthed kisses along the edge of her jaw and down her throat, shortening the air in her lungs and dragging the unguarded sighs from her mouth. She didn't know to be scandalized, only knew that she _wanted_ him to do this to her…whatever _this_ was.

The touch of his mouth was a fiery caress, stroking something lower than just her heart; something much more primal than anything she knew how to describe. Reaching for him, her fingers sliding against the strong, supple curves of the muscles in his back and shoulders, relishing the smooth texture of his shirt against her skin, falling ever steadily deeper into the spell he wove with such a brutal ease.

"You think I exaggerate? I don't," he spoke against the curve of her slender neck, inhaling deeply to smother his senses in the smell of her skin, rich and spicy with the beat of the blood pounding in her veins. "Every night I lie alone; desperately wishing I could go to you, aching to fill my mouth and hands with you."

His fingers curled into her flesh, gripping tightly to keep her still when she squirmed, gasping for breath under the crushing weight of his chest against hers. She would never have imagined the hardness of a man's body would feel so wonderful, but that had been before she'd met him and understood what was there to be relished.

It was almost worshipping in nature, that tender, forceful embrace, as though he was paying her tribute with the use of his hands and his soft, beautiful mouth. Yet at the same time, as gentle as he was, he seemed to be trying to absorb her, to breathe in as much of her as he could, as though he couldn't get enough of her…as though he would die without her. Gentleness with a distinctly desperate aftertaste.

"Do you have _any_ idea how long I've wanted to touch you like this? How close that want has driven me to insanity? _Mmm__—_how badly I've wanted to throw you over your living room table and show you just how sweet my love can be?"

Suddenly, more quickly than she could trace while so inescapably dazed, his voice was steely and black, that old-world slant of accent thickening as he spoke. Bitterness was rank on the breath that brushed the flesh exposed by her low neckline. "But I never did."

The strength in his hands was almost painful, pressing her flat against the hard brick so her spine couldn't bow the way it wanted to. He spoke in a growl, a vibration of sound rippling deep in his throat as he admonished harshly, "do you know why? Because no matter how many times I let you grow accustomed to my presence, or how many times I step back to give you space, I am _male._ And men, to you, are as good as evil incarnate."

When he kissed her, the touch of his mouth was rough and hard, the pressure on the border of bruising. It wasn't unpleasant, far from it, the sweep of his tongue could have sent her straight into some absurd fit of vapors worthy of some Victorian matron; feeding from her as though there was nothing in the world he needed as desperately as he needed her touch. But it was brusque enough to shake her from the throbbing, colorful world that was lust.

The warning Balael had given to her streaked across her brain like a shooting star.

_Just a suggestion. _

She stiffened, recalling the caution to stay away from touch, to avoid driving him into passions too strong to control, unable to determine whether to heed or ignore it. But doing so only served – in his eyes – to prove him right.

He pulled back quickly but not violently, all harshness gone, and set her feet gently on the pavement.

Instantly she understood her mistake, and while she felt flustered and befuddled, her spine still trembling and her skin feverish, she acted to remedy it. Almost blindly she searched for his arm or a shoulder, wanting to press her palms into the grooves between his collarbones and shoulders and forcefully tell him it wasn't true, that she didn't think him evil. But his hands caught her wrists to prevent it and when she looked at him, she could see the sorrow in his eyes. Such endless sadness that it nearly splintered her heart to see.

"I cannot change what I am or how I feel," he murmured, "any more than I could convince you that the sky is orange. I know why you're fearful, but I won't pretend that it doesn't hurt when you push me away."

"I don't think you're—"

He laid one finger across her mouth. "I know. You are not, however, ready to abandon that ideology." Her speech of protest was building, but he didn't give her the chance to give it. "Kisses are one thing. Total intimacy is something completely different, and while I may see it as something spiritual, you're not quite there yet. If I listened to your words alone and took you to bed now, you would grow to despise me, even if only because I couldn't stop when you told me to—and you _would._ Of that I have no doubt."

He relinquished his grip her wrists, allowing her arms to slide harmlessly around her suddenly throbbing middle, and she hung her head, knowing full and well that he was right. She wondered if she had ever felt more useless or broken than she did at that moment.

Countless barriers had been crossed, but one other was left stubbornly in his path; her inherent, fearful aversion to sexual contact. While at this moment it didn't seem that she'd ever had such a fear, he knew as well as she did, that she would only be able to go so far before her paranoia stopped her dead in her tracks and she panicked. She just couldn't cross that line between closeness and the invasion that mimicked the abuse she had both suffered and borne witness to.

She knew he loved her; she could feel it in his touch, his gaze, his very breath. Maybe her own affection was starting to flower in response to the care and attention, but when it came to this, it simply wasn't enough.

The weight of his palm smoothed against her hair. The touch was a message of forgiveness and understanding, his way of praising her willingness to try, and an apology for the rougher treatment. It brought the apology spilling from her trembling lips. "I'm sorry…" she whispered, swiping at the tears suddenly blurring her eyes. "But I still don't think your magic is bad."

Azrael's answering smile was tender, his arm looping around her waist to pull her into a gentle embrace. "Thank you," he replied softly, touching a feather-light kiss to her forehead. "Come. I'll see you home now."

For a moment she didn't move, her face remaining pillowed upon the slope of his chest, arms still wrapped tightly about her ribs while she listened to the steady beating of his heart. The soft rhythm was smooth and calming, perfectly mirroring the soothing strokes of his fingers against her dark, now quite mussed hair. "Do you work tomorrow?" she asked suddenly, her voice somewhat muffled by the cotton fabric of his shirt.

"I work every day," was his answer, spoken against the part of her hair, the curve of his cheekbone smoothing across the strands that had worked themselves loose from her bun. "Death waits for no man, woman, or force of weather. Why do you ask?"

"Well," she began slowly, "I'm going to dinner with my girls tomorrow, but would you want to do something before that?"

The thrumming vibration of his laughter warmed that achy place deep inside her. "Something, eh?"He chuckled, nuzzling the tip of his nose against her hair, the sweet scent of wild lily flowing down his throat. "You could always come flying with me…"

"_No,_ thank you," she interrupted quite forcefully and pressed the heel of her palm into his chest, pushing a few inches back to display her declination. "I'm—"

"Terrified of heights. Yes, I know." His nod was sagelike and serene, though the soft curve of his lower lip betrayed the hint of a smile. "But I honestly think I could break that fear," he took her arm, adopting that familiar gesture of an escort he so often offered her, and she recognized just how good it was to have him back again. "I would _never_ drop you, I hope you realize."

She snorted, her steps pausing mid-walk while she craned her head back in order to give him an exaggerated half-glare. "I know you wouldn't. But what's with making me sound like a stubborn horse?"

His laughter was loud that time, belling through the air like a clear song of amusement, his powerful arm hugging her close to his side. "Regardless; if you ever feel inclined, I'd be honored to oblige," here he gave a playful little bow, mocking enough to where it looked as though the servile manner had been copied from someone he'd known long ago.

"I don't know if I'll ever take you up on that," she admitted, "but thanks for the thought."

She looked up just in time to catch the flash of his answering smile. For the first time, she marveled at the expression of such complete fulfillment painted on his beautiful porcelain face, the serene shape to the aura that had for so long haunted her steps, much to her youthful inability to sense.

Back then he had been nothing more than a bodiless sense of feeling; watchful, caring, offering, but always with that underlying tinge of regretful emptiness. Looking at him now, knowing what and who he was, she decided that she could finally fathom that her devoted Presence had been, in fact, quite unsettled. He liked to pretend that he would have been able to get along just fine without her; but she could see now that this had been an overestimation of his strength.

It wasn't that he was weak. He was powerful in ways difficult for a mortal to comprehend, but the things that made him formidable also made him tender. Just how long he had suffered with the agony of not knowing whether or not she could ever look at him as anything more than some inhuman creature, she wasn't sure she wanted to know. How afraid he was of someday snapping, even hurting her…he would probably never say.

Yet he had persevered, battling his own fears in order to do right by her. His devotion twisted dark with longing for a connection she shied from time and time again. Not because he liked her, not even because he wanted her, but because he was her guardian in ways more binding than simply the preservation of her safety. He was hers; that was all there was to it. No matter what she chose.

That knowledge alone touched her in a place that had been so liberally and forcefully tucked away that she had forgotten it existed until that very moment.

She watched him quietly for a quiet moment while they walked; his pace an easy stroll which allowed her eyes plenty of freedom to wander from the sidewalk. Azrael truly seemed happy; the contentment in his eyes a luminance drawn from nothing more than simply being there, with her, without her distrust to knife him between the ribs.

She rejoiced at the lack of sorrow, and vowed then and there that she would do everything within her power to make sure that pained, wistful emptiness never stained his face again. If that meant dredging up the will someday to make herself limp and willing for him so he could do whatever would ease the aching she could almost taste on his sweet breath, then she would do so. As long as he gave her time, she felt she could do just about anything for him.

And what possibly could have given her the incentive to shift such a solid, hitherto unbreakable wall?

Because while once in a while he pushed her slightly beyond her comfort zone, she knew that if she told him no, and _meant_ it, he would stop. He was cynical and pessimistic enough to give himself a villain's limelight, but no matter how many times she was warned, instructed and cautioned, she simply could not picture her guardian as the monster he seemed to see in himself. That he had released her no less than twice that night proved it.

He's said she would hate him for being unable to exert control on his instincts, but she knew better. Her heart told her that if she pushed him into passion and pulled away, he _would_ let her go…but it could hurt him to do so. That alone gave her the reassurance she needed not to rush.

He needed to be loved, yes. He deserved to be, but not at the cost of agony for either of them. She had time; he would wait for her.

Lilith didn't realize the subject of her thoughts had stopped walking until the arm twined with hers pulled her backward when she took a step too far forward. She jerked slightly, jolted rather ungracefully from her reverie of conviction, and stumbled into his chest.

"_Oof_—sorry!" She apologized, humored by mild embarrassment for having been so thoroughly spaced-out, but he didn't seem to have noticed either her stumble or her words.

He was intent upon a target far to the right; staring toward another of Seattle's numerous twisty alleyways, eyes intent, nostrils flared as though trying to catch a scent on the breeze. Expression both puzzled and cautious, he tilted his head to the side, muttering with some hesitation; "I know that spell…"

Curious, she followed his gaze by lifting her eyes to the dank, grimy corner alley across the street where it turned into a niche fit for an old dumpster. As she peered through the mist of the dim-lit Seattle nighttime to see the chalky whiteness of a hand sprawled like a bleached spider, bloated and curled, upon the black cement. It took her a moment to realize exactly what it was, but when she finally did, the grip with which she seized Azrael's arm was hard with a mixture of disgust and horror.

"Oh my—" She gagged, choking on the sharp mouthful of air she took in when the gasp ripped from her throat. She had never seen a dead body before, but what else could that shriveled appendage belong to, all stiff and shriveled where it poked from between the small crowd gathered around it. Passersby, like them, who had stumbled across the morbid oddity.

There was a middle-aged couple, the woman's face almost as white as the hand at which she stared with such open horror, an elderly homeless man and three who appeared to be in their late teens – two girls and a boy. They stared on while the woman's husband, grayed and pushing forty, bent over the body to check for signs of breath or pulse.

The muscular structure of the angel's bicep stiffened beneath her hand as his focus shifted to the scene just yards away, _truly_ seeing now rather than _seeing__beyond_. It was what she had decided to call those moments when he seemed to space out like that; those moments when he looked more deeply into the world around him. Seeing beyond was what allowed him to sense and detect emotions in other people, what enabled him to know what was occurring elsewhere, and what gave him the ability to feel the mark of magic with such ease.

His eyes narrowed and darkened to a pitch that was closer to black than violet, the quiet rumble of a growl shivering from the depths of his chest to vibrate inside more than just her eardrums.

Without any hint of warning he strode forward, and for a moment Lilith lingered behind, watching him closely and with concern. A swirling mixture of dread, worry, and tremulous anger simmered in his wake, staining the air about him. It was eerie how very quickly his moods could warp and shift; but while the sight of him stalking toward what appeared to be a shadow-veiled cadaver and frightened onlookers was somewhat off-putting, she was also undeniably curious.

He had said; _I __know __that __spell._Therefore, something about what seemed to be nothing more than another victim of a dangerous city was an illusion or fabrication with magical roots. Despite her natural aversion to such risk, she was intrigued. The lure of the strange and the mythical was a powerful one and – more than she cared to admit – she wanted to watch her guardian work some magic himself.

She trailed behind him, catching sight of the shift in his loping gait and the nearly unnoticeable twitch of pale fingertips. Jogging up to the small group, he wedged himself between the teen boy and the older woman (who looked as though she were going to be sick) lifting his hand, within which was a rectangular piece of laminated plastic he flashed in a practiced manner before tucking it into the pocket of his faux-leather pants.

He had conjured it out of nowhere, which she concluded only because it was difficult to believe that Azrael ran around with a medical ID every day of his life.

"Excuse me, I'm a doctor," he said smoothly, the authority there utterly at home, as he approached the body lying heavily against the ground, "I need you all to step back, please."

The observers did as he asked, though Lilith caught the faint mutter from the middle-aged man stating frankly that Azrael didn't _look _like a doctor (which he really didn't), and the angel sank into a graceful crouch alongside the fallen male. Quite unabashedly accenting a firmly sculpted rear-end to a mortified Lilith's sight by doing so.

She felt her cheeks warm slightly when her eyes slid bashfully away from the sleek material that pulled tight against his flesh, determined not to sink into any spasm of inappropriately-timed appreciation. She really didn't want to think about how close she had just been to that beautiful figure just now. But looking elsewhere brought her attention to the fact that she was not the only one who had taken notice of the _doctor__'__s_ nicely-shaped body.

Two pairs of adolescent, mascara-rimmed eyes were locked on him, roving over the muscular curves of Azrael's thighs and backside, hawkish and hungry.

Hot and persistent, possessive envy reared up inside her like an angry cobra, and Lilith found herself working very, very hard not to reach out and trip the estrogen-enflamed little snits with one well-placed foot. What gave them the right to ogle him like that? But then again, what right did _she_ have, either? None at all; she wasn't his wife, wasn't even his girlfriend, just his ward. Theirs was a relationship with no real name, which meant it was probably best not to act like a scorned, insecure little girl boiling in hormones over a…_doctor._

Still considering gouging out the eyes of the two girls, she passed them with a sniff, kneeling down beside _her_ guardian angel. Yet as she was watching the movement of his hands from the owner of the hand's throat and head when one of them muttered approvingly, "I wouldn't mind him giving _me_ an examination. Would you look at that ass—_yow!__" _

Lilith gritted her teeth and ignored the comment, though, internally, she couldn't help but agree with the sentiment.

Azrael didn't seem to hear the girl. His attention was occupied completely by the problem set before him. The apparent-corpse was a man who looked to be somewhere in his late thirties, prematurely balding, plump, and rather unremarkable as far as looks went; but he didn't seem to be breathing, and he didn't seem to have a pulse.

The angel flicked his fingers absently, and Lilith watched with subtly-concealed surprised interest as a thin, rippling curtain of white mist rose to form a transparent barrier between the three of them and the observers. She knew without being told that it was an illusion to mask what he was really doing from the onlookers. When they looked, they would see him performing some kind of emergency medical treatment with a bag miraculously pulled out of nowhere. They would not see reality.

His fingers traced the trails of the main arteries from the temples to the heart, eyes serious and stern, focused with an intense amount of concentration on the points he touched while she observed. "An infectious curse," he murmured, "and a timed one." Glancing up at the sky, he performed a quick calculation and sat back on his heels. "Quickly then…"

"A what?"

"H's been cursed with an infection-spell that stalls the lungs and eventually the heart." He answered automatically, though she could tell his attention had shifted, and he was eyeing the people standing around him with a concerned appraisal.

"Under natural circumstances, in the case of a heart-attack, this would be easily dealt with. But it isn't natural, and has a time-limit. The body stays alive in a kind of coma until the point exactly five hours after the first midnight hour that occurs post-casting. If it isn't absolved by then, he and each of these people will die of heart-failure." Fire flared around his fingertips, wreathing his hand in a shroud of purple that licked at his skin, and left a thin-bladed dagger when it vanished. "That gives me roughly seven minutes to perform the counter-curse…and I need human blood to do it."

She almost laughed at the cliché of a blood-sacrifice. But she managed to swallow the sound upon the realization that he was serious. He was studying the people gathered behind the magical illusion-giving veil as if trying to judge which of them would be the easiest to compel into a donation, flipping the knife in a way that said he _really_ didn't want to involve any of them.

And then, so abruptly that it seemed amazing that she hadn't thought of it sooner, a solution presented itself. "You can use mine," she said, rolling up her sleeve to offer her arm to his cause.

Azrael snapped out of his intellectual stupor with a jolt so sudden, his eyes so abruptly pale with a look of such alarm that it was startling. "_Absolutely __not!__"_

"Why not?" She huffed, irritated by his protective display. "Better me than them, at least I don't have to be forced into doing it." When he merely gave her a look that was silent and stony, she wondered if his reluctance was due to the amount he required, and inquired, "how much do you need?"

"A teaspoon, maybe two," he answered distractedly.

"See? I'll do it. It's only a little bit of blood, and if it can save someone's life then there's no question. It'll be just like donating."

The angel remained resolute, growling tersely, "_no,_" and shutting out any further argument by turning his white-blond head back to the attentive audience.

She glared at him, infuriated by his refusal and argument to such a trivial thing. Why was he being so stubborn? This man's life was as jeopardy and he wouldn't let her donate her blood to help because of some ridiculous instinct. Talk about over-protective! Well, she'd had just about enough of that.

Making up her mind, she snatched the knife from his hand, ignoring his startled cry of shock to wildly and recklessly bringing the sharp silver blade down across her empty palm. It stung more than she had expected it to, and once the deed was done she was surprised at herself for such gumption. But after watching the blood begin to well from the shallow cut in her hand for a few seconds, she lifted her gaze to Azrael's beautiful face and said firmly; "there. Now _use_ it."

For the first time in a week, she felt a faint flicker of real, vivid fear when she met his eyes. There was no warmth whatsoever in those jeweled irises. He was angry. Scratch that, he was _livid_ – pure, icy, and terrible in his rage.

For two long, completely silent seconds, all he did was stare at her, those eyes burning like twin coals of hot garnet. A breathless moment passed, during which Lilith was quite certain he was going to strike her, certain he would use those powerful immortal hands of his to crush her skull in and properly punish whatever wrong she had committed.

But that was only the voice of an abused child reacting to the sharp crackle of fury in the air around him. All he did was let out a long, deep-throated hiss, the sound primitive and feral against the background noise of the homeless man inquiring whether or not an ambulance should be called. She shivered and shifted a few inches away from him, not quite bolstered enough by the lack of a slap to endure such a terrifying sound.

Strong hands gripped her arm, yanking it toward him to straighten her elbow over the half-corpse's torso. The sting of several long white fingers wiping roughly a half-teaspoon's amount of blood from the cut in her palm made her wince, but the touch he used was nothing but delicately and considerately gentle. As gentle as he could be when extracting blood.

Frankly, she was amazed. She wasn't sure exactly what she had done to evoke such a wrath but she _did_ know she had made him angry, and still he never raised his hand to her. How very strange; it was like something out of the fairytales she had almost literally consumed as a little girl. Imagine, making a man _that_ furious and he hadn't hit her. The very thought confounded her.

Abruptly he released her and she retracted her arm, cradling the scored palm in her empty hand and pressing down on the open gouge while her guardian's anger sealed itself away in his work. Just as a scholar could lose himself in study or a scientist could do so in an experiment, Azrael had immersed his consciousness in the problem before him, closed off from the rest of the world.

The angel traced a symbol over the man's pasty, ashen forehead, bloodied fingertips leaving a thick red stain in the shape of a symbol that seemed runic in shape. Then he was pressing his palms together, and somehow she could feel the magnetic pressure flowing between his hands like a current of energy, sparks scented like cloves, spicy and sweet, singeing the breath in her lungs. A slow, withdrawn moment later he lowered them to the motionless chest, resting one against the collar and one to the slope of the ribcage.

For a brief instant, the man's chest seemed aglow with a muted violet light. But then it was gone, and Azrael was lifting one hand to his mouth and blowing softly into a half-curled fist before smoothing it across the blood-marked forehead. "You will have no memory…a faint due to lightheadedness will do."

When the angel grew quiet, the fallen man stirred. Moaning, he took a breath into previously dysfunctional lungs and his eyelids flickered as though they were about to open. Azrael laid a surprisingly soft hand against the human's brow and the restless figure immediately slumped into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Lilith had not quite been able to trace what her guardian had done, but it had made the curse vanish into nothing more than dust. Awed by the new pulse, she leaned over the man's torso to watch his revived heart beat.

Azrael grasped her wrist, pulling her back from the human and crushing his thumb into her slit palm. The force with which he shoved healing magic into her flesh drove a sharp breath from her throat when she hadn't known she'd held it, thoroughly shocked by the sensation of a thick liquid flushing pain and broken cells into memory. She could almost feel each individual spellmark – uncertain as to how she could possibly know the magic was made with marks at all – for binding, closing, cleansing, sealing, and an abundance of others.

"Don't you _ever_ do that again," he ordered, his voice hoarse from the stress of his unshakable, and fretful temper.

"It's just a little cut," she groused at him, yanking back her hand and running the tips of curious fingers over where a cut, jagged with the slip of her pained surprise, had been just moments before. Now there was nothing more than smooth skin.

She squeaked when he grabbed her again, seizing her by the shoulders with a tight, possessing grip that could have crushed her delicate bones beneath his strength. His fingers dug into her flesh when he stared into her widened eyes. "Swear to me you won't raise a blade to yourself again," he said, and it was with such purpose that it wasn't even a plea.

He _demanded_ her obedience, something her guardian had never done before. He wasn't the type to force her compliance, and it was the first time she had ever known him to be this harsh. Even before, when he had asserted his certainty of her potential hatred, he had not been so rough as he was now; shaking her firmly by the shoulders, piercing her so deeply with his gaze that she felt sure she wouldn't be able to move again unless he allowed her to.

"_Swear __it,_" he growled, and the sound wrapped her body like a ribbon stitched with compulsion.

She strongly doubted she had any choice. The matter must have been gravely serious, more so than she had initially thought, for him to resort to using coercion magic to force her will. While a part of her resented this and wanted quite desperately to rebel, she shoved the moment of stubbornness aside. "Ok, ok! I won't."

Judging by the way his fair eyebrows knit together, clearly having sensed her automatic desire to fight him. "I should make you use an oath," he muttered darkly, eyeing her with a much gentler kind of worry now that she had made some sort of effort toward promising to be careful, "but I suppose that would be a bit much to ask." His hands slid from her shoulders, and she was left in a state of mild confusion mingling with small sparks of frustration.

He seemed disturbed by the situation; the blood-loss even more than the nameless man's near-death, and what made him anxious made _her_ anxious. She was a little shaken, but that was a combination of a lot of things. Mostly she just wished circumstances were different, because she was fairly certain even if she asked, he wouldn't tell her why he was so ruffled. But she asked it anyway, dearly hoping he might give her something.

"What's wrong?" she inquired, posing the question as delicately as she knew how and dearly hoping to avoid sending him into a bought of brooding silence.

Azrael wiped the conjured blade with his hand, the angel's personal supply of violet fire scouring blood-stains, and repeated the cleansing spell on the cement ground upon which some of the scarlet fluid had dripped. Not a trace of blood remained, leaving a clean, uncontaminated surface behind.

Though he still looked stony and somewhat bad-tempered, his tone was softer now. "Bad things can come of blood too freely offered…bad spells. Unless in the safety of your own dwelling, please," he rephrased the earlier-spoken demand into a quieter request, "do not cut yourself again apurpose."

She made a face; no one said _a__purpose_ any more. Then she sighed, and took his warning to heart. "Not that it's a hobby of mine to cut myself, but I promise."

He gave her a look that she interpreted as exasperatedly humored, and gave her a small smile, seeming calmed. Then he turned his attention to the people still staring concernedly into the cloud of illusion wrapped around them like a light fog.

While she watched him stand and use skillfully crooked, fire-rimmed fingers to sketch a line of glowing symbols into the air, she contemplated his reactions to her moment of impromptu self-mutilation. He was always extraordinarily protective of her and didn't like to see her hurt, but somehow this had been different. But what could injure her via blood, and so badly as to cause him such a panicked response to avoid it? HIV or Hepatitis? Somehow, she didn't think so.

Whatever it was he seemed so concerned about, she would probably never know, but she felt rather accepting of that. They didn't say ignorance was bliss for no reason, after all.

He didn't look inclined to tell her about it. In fact, he seemed determined not to; all the better to shield her from it, most likely. Maybe she found it to be a little on the pushy side, but somehow it didn't seem to bother her as much as it might have. Maybe in anyone else she would have found it an annoying, clingy quality. If Kevin had tried to be so domineering she would have thrown him like a bucking horse to make him let go.

She hadn't liked any intently-focused attention from men; often with other connotations sealed away beneath the surface, of pain or lust, or some other wish of malcontent. But, clichéd as it sounded, Azrael was truly quite different. Instead of controlling her, she found his concern and his watchful eye both sheltering and tender.

He was busy weaving magic to create a fabricated scenario for the other mortals to see, flickering magical signs she glimpsed from beneath the angle of his outstretched arm. They crackled and popped like real, solid bits of fire in the chilled air, written like Japanese prose in long, straight lines.

Lilith was impressed; not only by the skill it must have taken to convince the people watching to meander away, satisfied by the illusion that the victim was being sped off in an ambulance, but by the terrible anger he had managed to banish so quickly.

Her life had hardly been consumed by pain or difficulty, but she had never before been exposed to that level of wrath and not received a blow because of it. But Azrael wouldn't have harmed her. In truth, she didn't think he had the capacity to do so. Not anymore.

She scrambled to her feet when she saw him wave a hand to release the shield of illusion, his steps casual when he began to walk back toward the mouth of the alley. "What about him?" she called, indicating the man still prone on the ground.

He glanced at her over his black-clad shoulder and tilted his head dismissively. "He'll be fine. I've instructed him to wake in three minutes' time with the memory that he was feeling light-headed and dizzy enough to cause a blackout. No harm, no foul, no lasting after-effect." He held out his hand, an indication she should follow him, and she did so.

"What do you think did that to him?" she asked, buttoning up her jacket and looking up at her companion.

They were walking down James Street now, where it intersected with Second Avenue. It was a quiet Wednesday night, but in the daytime it housed her all-time favorite book and music store; long closed now with its wide, clear windows dark and the door locked but comfortable and familiar, all the same.

The expression on the angel's face gave virtually nothing away. He wore a blank mask shadowed with mere traces of contemplation, but he did answer her. "_Who,_ I think, is the question. And I'm not certain. I may have to do some investigation—"

For the second time he stopped, his entire body frozen where he stood like a hunted deer determined to blend in with the background, his eyes riveted to the oddly quiet street.

She turned this way and that, trying to spot whatever had caught his attention, but found nothing. The keen alertness to his posture was unnerving when just mere seconds ago he had been perfectly calm; the annoyance gone, the worry escalated to something far more intensely directed. Now the very air around him pulsed, thrumming with a sense of finely-tuned alarm as her gaze fixed to his ivory face, somehow whiter than usual.

Suddenly he was gripping her arm, the pressure careful but urgent when he gave her a push toward the silver, red-striped Corvette parked outside the newly-opened, horrendously expensive French restaurantto their right. "Get in the car," he told her roughly, and he looked so dreadfully serious that she had little desire to question him.

And yet…

"But it's not ours, and besides, it's—"

She was going to mention that the doors were locked and that therefore entry was impossible, but the phrase was torn from her by shock as her guardian pulled back one arm and sent his fist smashing through the glass of the drivers-side window.

Though his knuckles were scraped raw and bleeding by the jagged edges of broken anti-theft safety glass, he paid the probable pain no mind and reached inside the gaping hole to undo the locks. The mechanism clicked once and popped meekly open, as though humbled by the angel's incredible show of strength. Lilith got inside without another, shutting the door and deciding that it was a far better option _not_ to mention the illegality of what they were doing.

Azrael's eyes darted outward to the street and he cursed vividly. Her eyes widened even further, if it was possible, unaccustomed to hearing expletives she recognized instead of the elegantly-worded profanities of the many other languages he used to mask them when in her presence. But she definitely understood the word _fuck._

It was only a word, yet coming from him it sounded like an announcement of the apocalypse.

He slid into the car, ignoring the splintered glass and slamming his door into place, stealing a moment to study the control panel with eyes nearly white with pressure she didn't know how to process.

It was then that the growling came, low and rank with the mad froth of a rabid dog. She jumped, hearing the deep, investigative sniffing of something outside the car, the padding steps accented by shallow, wet snorts of some large, probably leaking nose.

"Azrael…" She could hear the tremor in her own voice as she began, but broke off with a shriek when an unknown weight crashed straight into her side of the car.

The metal screeched, denting beneath the collision. Lilith lurched to the left, almost impaling herself on the gearshift in her haste to get away, her eyes huge with terror as she met the burning voids of the thing that stared at her through the glass. Eyes set in an oily, black-furred face.

Vaguely she heard Azrael muttering under his breath, "I don't have _time_ for this—" and barely had the wits left to look away from the furry, sickeningly humanoid hands pawing at her window. But when she did, it was to see the angel reach under the steering wheel to puncture the fiberglass interior with his bloodied hand.

Ignoring the eerie scrape of the black-stained nails against the glass surface, he gripped the mass of wires that spilled like multicolored guts from the interior, yanking at one green and one red until they snapped. With deft fingers he touched the two bare wires together, and the engine snarled into life. Immediately he took hold of the stick, shoved the gears into reverse and slammed his booted foot into the accelerator.

In mere seconds Azrael maneuvered the Corvette into a complete one-eighty degree turn, shifted to first gear, and had them hurtling down the street toward the interstate at a speed that made the blood drain from her head. The girl beside him was certain the entirety of her insides were left back in the parking space, because surely they had just jumped to Warp Speed.

She was so utterly terrified she couldn't even scream – the buildings and lights of the city _flying_ passed them, a blur of streaking white and red embedded in darkness. The speed made her nauseous, yet she was too frightened to close her eyes for even an instant, sure beyond doubt they must have been going over two-hundred miles per hour and wondering exactly when Azrael had been rendered insane.

And then he was yanking the wheel to the side, braking so hard that the tires spun and they slid sideways before he threw the gear into park and shoved his door open. "Stay inside," he told her sternly, harder than steel and unyielding as iron nails, meeting her eyes for the briefest instant before getting out to stride briskly from the car.

He had driven so far that they weren't even in Seattleanymore, but somewhere in Bellevueon a hilly, winding, deserted street that overlooked Lake Washington, the grassy earth sprawled toward the trees was white with frost. He had gone so _fast,_ and yet they weren't yet safe. Her heart still pounding like a drum against her ribs, she craned her head to look for Azrael, watching him watch the road he had nearly driven them off of.

For over three minutes he was absolutely motionless, staring off into the distance before he suddenly moved, chin lifting to pin his keen gaze to something more specific than a general direction.

It came bounding down the highway, too quickly for any natural animal, and for the first time she got a good look at it – not that she knew what to call it when she did. A spindly, waifish creature shaped like a dog and melded with the body of a man. It ran on canine hind legs and hand-shaped forepaws, its elongated half-muzzle dripping, as was the rest of its fur-covered body, with some oily black substance.

She knew no words capable of describing such a horror. She would have screamed had she any breath to do so. But all she could do was stare, petrified with disgust with bile in her throat, as it loped steadily toward the angel, massive feet eating up the space between them in mere seconds. The creature's burning eyes were fixed on her unarmed guardian, deranged, hungry for blood.

She wanted to yell for him to run, to get back inside the car, to do _something_ other than stand there and let it attack him like it was clearly going to. But Azrael had no real intention of letting it harm him. Her angel was _never_ defenseless.

One more bounding step brought the thing close enough to leap for him, front claws outstretched, mouth aiming to tear out the angel's pale throat. Azrael feinted to the side, powerful body shifting smoothly with a skillful ease, throwing out an arm as it turned in midair to snap at him with sharp, stained teeth. Expression cold and focused, he brought his bloodied hand crashing down onto the base of the creature's head.

Violet fire burned her retinas and a high-pitched howl jarred the quiet night like the mournful cry of a banshee. The thing fell like a stone, its spine severed, and instantly began to disintegrate.

Sparing no time to celebrate his victory, Azrael turned sharply on his heel and walked swiftly back to the still purring car. The cuts were all long-healed by now, but he threw the gear into first, then second and third with a hand stained with his own dried blood.

When he steered them back onto the road, his strenuous speed didn't relax, even though now there was nothing from which to run. Lilith gripped her armrest with white-knuckled fingers, terror from both speed and visual trauma sending her pulse careening into panicked speeds and her brain to repeat; _I'll be fine, I'll be fine, everything's fine._

"I told you bad things can come from blood," he told her, his eyes flickering to check the rear-view mirror.

She couldn't look at him, or back at the remains of the creature they were speedily leaving to dust. Her eyes were plastered firmly to the windshield, wide as saucers, staring in a sickened state of entrancement as the buildings once again blurred into highway. "Wha—what was…" she stammered, trying to lock the question in place in order to speak it, but she couldn't quite manage. Apparently that was enough.

"Deacca," he informed her, "a tracker and an assassin. Half demon-spell and half damned soul welded together by magic and summoned by blood." His expression was grim, his jaw set and his eyes still quite pale though he seemed much calmer than before. "The good thing is they're easy to kill once you get enough ground to be ready for them. The bad thing…killing them gets rid of any evidence they were there at all."

He sighed heavily and lifted his bloodied hand to flex it experimentally. "If I'd been prepared, and if you hadn't been in danger, I could have disabled and kept it for analysis. But I was surprised and now I can't use it to find out who exactly is hunting you." He took a sharp right to exit the Interstate and Lilith whimpered, clutching even more tightly at the armrest.

Azrael, assuming this sign of distress was related to his subject, reassured her gently, "have no fear. I'll find them. No harm will come to you, I promise."

"No, no…it's not that—" She gasped when the road began to curve into a tight turn, clawing, white with terror, at his leg. "_Stop the car!"_

He braked immediately, slowing to a tidy stop just before the stoplight at the end of the exit where it merged intoSeattlestreets, his eyes concerned when he looked at her. "Are you all right?"

"You—" She spluttered, her grip still tight at the slope of his thigh as she fought to calm herself, "you drive like a suicidal _lunatic!"_

The angel's white-blond brows rose. "We were just attacked by a demon tracker and you're fretting about my driving? My reflexes are more than quick enough to prevent a crash." It wasn't said out of arrogance, simply a stated reality, but the fact that he seemed to have followed her fear quickly enough to answer it in that knowing fashion made her blood boil.

"Remind me," she muttered bitterly, still too shaken to glare at him, "_never_ to get in a car with you _ever_ again."

He smiled, but inclined his head to display empathy. "My apologies, I'm accustomed to great speed when I travel." She muttered something about adrenaline-crazed men, but he merely chuckled and drove her home in the dented, hijacked Corvette, carefully and considerately keeping the MPH reading under fifty.

Internally, however, he wasn't laughing.

That was twice tonight immortal magic had shown up in the premises, and this last so much more severe than a simple infection spell. Historically, setting a Deacca on an angel was considered an act of war. But he knew very well the assassin had not been intended for _him._ He could far too easy retrace the creature back to its origins and creator, however Lilith was an easy target, unable to defend herself against something as relentless and driven as a Deacca.

Whoever had sent it had not intended her to survive. Either they hadn't expected him to be there or it was intended as a warning that would be made circumstantially untraceable. Whichever the case, he didn't like it; the whole thing reeked of a plotting, ulterior motive.

Tracking spells relied heavily on the use of a focus and body-fluids were the most desirable. The knowledge of such spells was wide-spread amongst mages, with no way to tell one casting source from another without concrete, physical evidence to use in following the spell's trail from caster to receiver.

He hadn't thought there was any of her blood left from her generous donation, but there had been a moment when the cut was open and unguarded. Theoretically some could have been stolen while he was distracted with performing the counter-spell on the man…by someone who knew how he constructed his shields. He had a suspicion, and Deacca usually hailed from a specific place in Hell overflowing with souls to use as an anchor, but he couldn't act. He had no proof to support an investigation.

He should have thought it though more carefully, but not only had he needed to keep Lilith from harm, but he'd had to lead the creature away from the city and its people. After the spine was severed they self-destructed, the black, poisonous oil coating them boiling to a breaking point to release the soul back to hell and the body to disintegrate in a burning oblivion of magic and white ash. It left no mess, but it was noisy, and it was part of his duty as a divine subject to preserve the state of ignorance between humanity and the immortals.

There were better ways of dealing with Deacca, but Lilith was safe; and that was all that truly mattered.

With the change of pace, Lilith calmed considerably, fear and near-hyperventilation deescalating slowly but surely into regulated breath. She no longer felt liable to suffer a sudden, painful death if she happened to blink at the wrong second. Rather, she felt far safer knowing that the speed of the car had decreased and that her guardian was whole and well beside her, if a little on the tempestuous side of things.

She might have worried about having angered him had the course of the night been any different. As it was, Lilith knew very well that the angel's temperament had nothing to do with her and everything to do with the unexpected demon magic he had been faced with, and the possibility of his ward coming to danger.

This, too, should have frightened her – knowing she was the target of some otherworldly assassin's wrath – but she felt neither threatened nor scared, merely rattled. Perhaps when in the company of a man like Azrael, it was impossible to feel anything but cradled in the folds of safety.

When he stopped at the curb alongside the entrance to her apartment, she admitted, "this was definitely not the most relaxing night out."

"I concur," he agreed, running a hand through his hair and bracing an elbow against the steering wheel while he turned in the leather seat to face her. The light in his eyes was complex and multi-faceted; a base of tired concern streaked with puzzled interest and the barest hints of pride. "Though I must say, you're very calm considering what you've seen tonight. I've known mortals to go mad after setting eyes on a Deacca."

She shrugged and pushed the dented door open, her smile somewhat sheepish, though her voice was frank when she answered, "maybe I'm getting used to the weirdness. I'll have to—I'm dating one of God's angels."

He looked surprised. Maybe that had something to do with her calling the freakish demon-creature _weird._

Poised to get out, she hesitated inside the sleek leather interior. Then, courage mustered, she leaned over the emergency brake, cradled his cheek in a soft hand, and shyly kissed him.

He went very still, as if startled, but then he seemed to warm beneath her mouth, marble lips gentle to her bashful touch, and lifted his arm in order to brush two affectionate fingertips to her chin to return the gesture. She slid from the car with pink cheeks and stepped onto the curb, shoving the dented metal door shut and turning to ascend the stairs with a timid wave.

And though it was faint under the purr of the engine encouraged to return to its rightful owner, he could hear the words she spoke to herself with his inhuman ears.

"Well, _that_ part wasn't so bad."

He smiled, a ray of happiness piercing the dark cloud that had coiled around him. "Indeed," he murmured in hearty agreement, feeling strong enough to take on any challenge set to him.

Though perhaps not the one watching him depart with coldly thoughtful crimson eyes.


	26. Portrait of the Heart

**Chapter 25  
**Portrait of the Heart

Recommended Listening: "Bout It [Instrumental Version]" by Young Joc and 3LW,  
"Cry of the Celts" by Ronan Hardiman [from Michael Flatley's Lord of the Dance],  
"Nature, the Gentlest Mother" (featuring Dawn Upshaw), "The Dodger,"  
"Simple Gifts," and "Zion's Walls" (all featuring Thomas Hampson) by Aaron Copland

* * *

"I think we could push this lift a little higher."

The look she gave him was a disbelieving collaboration of incredulity and refusal, the answer evident in her expression before she even opened her mouth to speak. "_Heck_ no! It's already _too_ high!" she shrieked, reminding herself that this endeavor had been her idea.

While the original intent had been to bring him a little more deeply into her life via an outing, they had mutually agreed it would be a better use of their time to rehearse. To go through the duet and do some cleaning and refining on their own, without Jessica hovering like an anxious mother bird. But it was Thanksgiving break – a week-long vacation leading up to Thursday the 24th – which meant the studio was closed. Azrael had come up with a solution; to utilize one of Seattle's numerous gyms.

She'd been skeptical, unsure if any gym would have enough room for their needs, but he had insisted there would be. As usual, he was right. The owner, upon Azrael's request for space to rehearse, had sent them to the room intended for mainly for wrestlers and yoga students. Yet it was perfect; spacious, well-lit, and even had a slightly padded floor.

They had taken to running through the dance phrase by phrase, pausing every now and then to rework some steps, troubleshoot alternative paths to get to their next spots, and make small adjustments when needed. She'd collaborated quite cheerfully, too, contributing ideas and changes quite acutely in her own observation.

Yet it had been the suggestions she made about a certain section that had led to Azrael's mention of the lift. There were several in the piece, and up until then he had been keeping them rather shallow, chest-height at the very most, knowing that her terror of heights didn't think very highly of being vaulted through the air above his head. The mention of making them higher seemed to sap her of cheer.

Though they were isolated by the Plexiglas wall between the room and the main floor of the gym, a few people passing on their way to the weights shot them a slightly startled look in response to her cry of outrage and alarm.

Azrael shushed her with smiling disapproval – something which seemed impossible, but he managed nonetheless. "I know you're not fond of lifts, but honestly. I _can _hold your weight."

She flushed, unconsciously recalling the last time he had lifted her feet clear off the ground. At the time, it had been to crush her back into a cement wall and curl his lips around her earlobe, whispering things that sent a reminiscent stab of heat to twist around her stomach. With a frown, she snapped, "I _know_ that."

"Do you?" He snapped back, though his tone was immensely less harsh than hers, crossing his arms over his chest. "Then have a little faith. Let's try it again."

"No," she shut the topic down with a ring of finality in her tone, turning to the side and playing with a balancing technique. "What about the turn combination? Any problems with that—?"

"_Lilith…_" he interrupted her with a low peal of amusement, "you weigh hardly anything to me. I'm not going to drop you." She sent him a withering stare, and he responded by adjusting his weight, clearly intending for her to run at him as the choreography demanded. "Come on," he cajoled, keeping his voice gentle and soothing.

Hands on her hips, she retorted, "If I'm too light, I'll just go right over your head."

Green eyes sharp, she attempted to stare him down; but it wasn't much of a contest when the other player simply wasn't participating. He merely beckoned her forward with the minute crook of two fingers. But she was just as stubborn as he was, and added to the nonverbal conversation with a shake of her head. That was when he gave her the look. He didn't even have to say anything, just looked at her with those piercing eyes of his, pale eyebrows raised; assuming, waiting…and she caved.

She braced herself as if to run and found her muscles locked by the spasm of fear spun from the idea of being raised into the air. "I can't," she insisted, shamed by how close it had come to a whine.

He gave her a second look, this time with only a single eyebrow lifted to give his fair face a measuring, unimpressed edge. "For goodness' sake," he said, though the emphasis he used was neither hard nor annoyed, "just _run._"

She bristled like an angry mongoose. "_Fine!_" Gathering her will in spite of nerves that seemed to sing with alarm, she took a breath and dove into a sprint, aiming right for him, adrenaline pounding alongside the blood in her veins. She let out a full-fledged shriek of muted terror and frustration as the space between them shrank faster and ever faster.

Then she was in the air, his arms wrapped about her thighs just above the knee to boost her into an easy lift, looking up at her with just the barest hint of an: _I told you so. _

It was the highest he had ever gotten her and the world around her warped and spun, her heart fluttering with palpitations and the breath becoming thin and ragged in her throat. She scrabbled for a support, raking at his shoulders with trembling fingers. "_Put me down put me down put me down!_" she squeaked, clutching at his chest when he obeyed and set her gently back on her feet.

"You're perfectly fine," he told her calmly, rubbing her back with the palm of one hand to soothe the crackle of fear.

It took her a minute, but she calmed, panic dulling to a mild simmer of frazzled nerves. Still a little shaky around the edges, she said, "ok, we can make it higher—but only if you promise to never do that again."

With a warm chuckle, he gave her a nod. "Deal."

"Don't make me do it again," she pleaded, resting her forehead against his collarbone with her eyes tightly shut and praying he would agree.

The touch of his hand was at her neck when he answered, brushing at her nape where her hair lay tightly knotted; a caring touch, though he already knew she was well. "As you wish," he murmured, "shall we move on?"

She stepped backward and away from the shelter of his offered arm and contemplated the strange little part of herself that was thoroughly exasperated by her own demand. Maybe it was because of the cold from the removal of his arms that she decided: _to hell with fear. _Or maybe it was because of the gentle consent not to push her any farther than he knew she could go. Whichever was the case, she found herself blurting, "maybe we should do it one more time, just for practice."

His reply to her suggestion was a smooth smile. "From the beginning of the phrase, then?" he asked, and she nodded assent, turning to offer her back. The hand which took steady hold of her arm was both sturdy and careful not to crush her fragile bones, as though it was second-nature to him to be so gentle. His voice was a low murmur as he counted off for them, "five, six, seven, eight—"

If there was one thing she had learned quite quickly while partnering with him, it was that the Picture Frame analogy only worked for certain kinds of dancing.

Teachers always told the boys to think of themselves as frames with the purpose to show off the beautiful picture their partner was. And that didn't quite cut it for whatever this was. Instead of settling to just serve as her frame, Azrael deemed it fitting to add to the picture itself, etching some priceless, elegant scrolling into the woodwork and inlaying shades and colors of mood to whatever it was he did.

The phrase itself was rather lengthy, something between a cannon and a lyrical stanza full of turns and crafted with a subtle back-and-forth sway. Amid the contraction-_jeté _combination, which led into a quick set of turns, right at the moment when his arm curled around her waist and his cheek brushed lightly to hers, it was clear that he was more than a mere frame. Without him she would have fallen to the floor, unable to perform the flowing, airily liquid movement so dependant on collaboration.

She all but threw her back into the _combr__é,_ using a kind of energy she hadn't been accessing a few minutes earlier, letting him support her just as she let him guide her from step to step, following his lead. The mesh of twirls and footwork came with the graceful ease of the inner-spirit that so loved her art.

They separated, diverting into a second short cannon full of arms and twists of the torso, whirling and wistful, before splitting to devote energy to two different things. Azrael's figure adapted to an acrobatic roll when she leapt.

Again they came together; pausing to touch, standing cheek to cheek. Things that had been daunting before came without flaw. Steps that had seemed to demand so much energy and breath seemed to come so easily now. And when they folded smoothly into the dip – her arms free to give it the flaunting edge of ecstasy and welcome the lips that just grazed her breastbone – it was with such simplicity that it felt as though time was slipping peacefully away.

With a combination of trust and the desire to be close to him, she took to the final set of rapid turns under the angel's assisting hand with a fresh determination before she was released. After the fourth twirl, she didn't even wait to see if he'd prepared or not, but surged into the light, practiced lope, leaving apprehension gaping in her wake.

His shoulders were flexed beneath the grip of her fingers; his arm muscles braced and ready to catch her. Using his graceful immortal power to carry her up and turned her body midair so her back was arched over his head, allowing her to take her pose as comfortably as if she were within inches of the floor. It was true, her eyes were closed, carefully avoiding sight which might jumpstart the fuse to her fear, but she remained composed, even managing to find a semblance of joy within the effortless, weightless sensation of it.

When he swung her back down, she turned her head to look at him, meeting the violet eyes so bright with life, and gave him a pretty, breathless smile.

"I did it!" She beamed, giddily pleased with the success. "Or…" she correcting sheepishly, "you did it, and I didn't freak out!" Upon having the tip of her nose affectionately pinched, the soft sound of his amusement in her ears, she found that she simply couldn't stop laughing.

Somehow, she wound up on the floor, curled in a ball with her arms clamped around her aching sides. Hiccoughing between her scattered bursts of giggles, she delighted in the bell of Azrael's musical laughter as he knelt behind her with a bit more dignity.

"You should smile more often," he told her. "You're absolutely beautiful when you smile."

"I do smile," she argued, nearly choking on a leftover peal of giggling. "I smile all the time."

"_Real_ smiles, not polite ones," he corrected. "Smiles made with laughter, like this—" and he dug his fingers into her vulnerable side.

She shrieked with laughter, convulsing around the relentless onslaught of tickling, swatting at his hand to make him stop. When he finally relented, she discovered that she had managed to roll onto her back and that he was leaning over her, brushing wisps of dark hair from her eyes. The pace of her breathing steadied and calmed, the rise and fall of her chest slowing as she tilted her chin upward to meet the warm glow of his gaze.

Lifting a delicate hand, she grazed the arc of his cheekbone with a pair of her fingertips; a light, experimental touch, wondering and flattered despite herself. "I'm not beautiful," she informed him with a quietly bashful smile, "but thank you for saying it."

The sigh he heaved was exaggerated. "If I didn't know you're this modest by nature, I would accuse you of fishing for compliments." She gasped, startled, her jaw dropping to express a shocked cry of denial. But he hushed her swiftly with a kiss, one that lingered just long enough to steal the fuel for her argument and leaving her biting her lip against how much she had enjoyed it.

"Only teasing," he murmured playfully. "But if you could see yourself through my eyes, perhaps you'd understand."

He slid smoothly to his feet, delivering a charming smile toward the passersby outside the glass, and held out his hand to her. "Come along, you're supposed to meet your ladies in only twenty minutes."

Still smiling like an idiot, she accepted his hand, following the patient strength towing her toward the locker rooms where they parted ways, he for the men's and she for the women's. She was slow to change out of her flexible dance clothes and into jeans and blouse, torn between a strange mix of relaxation and a tingling, electric energy fluttering like butterflies inside the walls of her stomach.

She had never really been much of a giddy person, but something about being called beautiful from a mouth as lovely as Azrael's didn't leave room for much of anything _besides_ giddiness. So, swallowing the dreamy sigh of a complete and utter sap, she yanked on shoes, jacket, and scarf, before shouldering her bag and all but skipped out to wait for her escort.

Azrael took a great deal longer than she had expected he would, considering how prompt he usually was. She waited with her shoulder propped against the wall between the two locker room doors, growing increasingly more and more worried with each second that passed. She was so focused on her undefined worry that when the men's door was finally thrown open, she nearly jumped out of her skin.

But it wasn't the angel who exited, instead she saw a slim young man with his head tilted high, pinching his nose between two fingers that were shiny and red with blood.

She edged backward, both disgusted and startled. But when Azrael exited just behind the other man, she froze, watching him cast a distinctly displeased look over his shoulder toward the sound of vivid cursing emanating from the lockers and putting out an arm to keep the bleeding youth from walking into a wall.

"What happened?" Lilith squeaked, concerned and alarmed by the icy sheen slowly sliding from the angel's countenance. He didn't appear to be injured, his white collar blood-free, but she gave him a thorough once-over just in case.

"People quarrel over ridiculous things," he answered, convincing the other male to turn and show him the bleeding nose, which he examined with a few careful touches to the bridge. "And sexual orientation is one the stupidest. Stop squirming." The order was rapped coolly and swiftly in a tone that was accustomed to giving orders, and even more accustomed to seeing them followed. It was the kind of order you wanted to obey.

The young man stilled, trying his best not to grimace under the pain of having his bludgeoned nose prodded by a stranger. He did a rather valiant job of it, too. He looked no older than Lilith, but _she_ would have needed sedation.

"No break," Azrael informed him, "and the bleeding is stopping. You'll be fine in a few hours, just breathe slowly and ice it to keep the swelling down."

Looking like he'd just been saved from death or worse (how ironic), the young man gave him a warm smile, his eyes liquid with a mixture of awe and all-too human adoration. "You aren't single, by any chance?" he asked thickly around the tender tissue of his nose, and Lilith had to bite her own tongue to keep from gaping at the boy's gall.

Although, how was he supposed to know he'd just made a verbal pass at an angel?

Azrael didn't seem perturbed. He merely offered a thin smile and said, "sorry, no."

Though he did look disappointed, the boy shrugged and offered thanks as Azrael turned and headed off, Lilith right on his heels, almost beside herself with curiosity. As soon as they were out of earshot, he summarized vaguely, "someone found it offensive to be in the same vicinity as a person with different attractions. They argued; then the argument turned to fists."

"He got punched in the nose because he likes men instead of women?" She frowned, "that's not right."

He laughed, the sound both bemused and somewhat abashed. "You should see the one that picked the fight in the first place."

The look she shot him was shrewd, her eyes fixed to his face as he held the door open for her to step out onto the sidewalk that ran alongside the intersection of Third and Union. "What did you do?" she asked dryly, lifting a wary eyebrow.

"Nothing but defend myself when I got in the way and faced the threat of making friends with fingers I really had no desire to."

She made a noise of pure doubt. "You expect me to believe some guy could actually hurt you?"

He shook his fair head, slipping on his gloves, the soft black leather wrapping his skin and outlining the powerful lines of tendon and bone. "No, but he wasn't aware of that fact; and I can't exactly risk taking a hit to the face and having nothing to show for it."

_Good point_…any normal person would bruise like crazy.

"And—as I said—I had no real need to know where his hands had been before they went for my head. I doubt they would've tasted very nice."

Her brow furrowed. "Do hands _ever_ taste good?"

One of his eyebrows rose. She almost knew what would come before he had even reached for her wrist, the soft leather of his glove butter-smooth against the delicate skin at the tender space beneath her palm, and lifted her hand to his mouth. Yes, he was only proving a point, but she still found her spine turning to liquid when his white lips parted to touch the tip of his tongue to her fingertip. It rendered her utterly helpless when faced with the wide prospect of what that point could be.

It was nothing more than a brief, tiny lick, over before she could even register the contact of velvet tongue to suddenly tingling skin, innocent as a kitten. Only more teasing, it seemed; and yet it seemed to shake her more roughly than his whispered kissed did. It also drove the original question of what exactly he had done to _defend himself_ right out of her head.

There was a smile in his eyes when he adjusted the grip of his hand so that it cradled hers as they walked, heading for the corner Janelle had arranged for her girls to meet, all hint and suggestion smoothed away.

She found herself smiling, realizing just how much she treasured the feel of him holding her hand, the wintry chill putting a flush into her cheeks and toying with his white-blond bangs. "Point taken and filed."

"Good," he replied softly, "about time you appreciated the lengths I go to in order to please you."

She just shook her head, too torn between amusement and blushing to answer.

"Hey there!"

They looked up to see the trio of girls waving and calling from the other side of the street, pink-cheeked and bundled up against the cold, to whom Lilith beamed and waved back. "Want to come say hello?" she asked the angel beside her, peering up with a pair of bright, happy green eyes.

Azrael's expression seemed to soften when he looked at her, fair face serene and violet eyes warm while he brushed his black-sheathed knuckles against her cheek. "How I can deny you anything is beyond me," he said matter-of-factly, the words light with a humor that made her heart sing. "But perhaps another time." When she nodded, her cheer falling infinitesimally to a softer glow, he added, "your poor girls could use a good mystery in their lives."

She laughed out loud. "About as much as I need exposure to lifts!"

"Precisely," he agreed soberly, then curved a hand around the back of her neck to pull her into a kiss.

The laughter died in her mouth, smeared by the sweep of his tongue and the gentle graze of his teeth to tease her lower lip. A swirl of sweetened emotion and tender yearning that caused her toes to curl and her back to arch with the desire to press herself into his body.

The audience was forgotten, the street disappeared, the whole world around her nothing but a dusty blur compared with the touch of his mouth, the brush of leather at her nape and the hard grip of his arm around her waist. There was nothing but him, the soft heat of his breath and the slide of her palms against the sleek white of his shirtfront, clutching at his chest as though he was her connection to life itself.

And then he released her, withdrawing slowly enough to drive her half-mad with a crazy urge to pull him back by his pretty ponytail and crush her lips back to his. Breath shallow and heartbeat racing with impulses she knew she shouldn't want to follow so badly, she muttered, "great—they'll torture me all night for that." Still, she wound her fingers in his collar, senses filled with the clean, musky scent of his throat.

His laughter was a soft rumble beneath his chest, the gentle rub of his nose to the tip of hers a loving and affectionate match. "I certainly hope so."

"You jerk."

Again the sound of his amusement rang bell-like and full within her ears, wrapping her in an embrace of peace and comfort even while he stepped back. He squeezed her hand before letting it slip from his grasp, content to abandon her to the small pack of females exchanging delightedly shocked whispers behind their hands.

"Have a good time," he bid her cheerfully, delivering a friendly wave toward the girls, who continued to twitter and giggle.

Despite her chagrin upon having to deal with her now quite seamlessly provoked circle of friends, Lilith watched him leave with nothing but warmth in her heart. Sure, she may have to listen to them whine and plead with her to gossip; where they'd come from, what they had been doing all afternoon, how good of a kisser he was…but to her, it was more than worth it.

There weren't a lot of things she would put up with Sarah's interrogations for, but his kisses, she decided, were one of them.

...

The sickening impact of bone to bone, a fist cracking into an already bloodied face sent a body heaving to the ground.

The heavy thud was accented by a whimper, a noise of pain dedicated to the abuse which had shattered the ball joint of one shoulder and fractured several ribs. Through split lips and two knocked-out two teeth, there was no answer. Only more pain delivered by a savage kick between the shoulder blades, and a yelp that didn't dare voice outrage to the treatment.

While marginally strong for his race, the human had no chance to fight back against the demon rage unleashed upon his body. He was frail and delicate under the steel of the bones sent smashing into his back, cursing himself for his failure and hoping the punishment would soon be over.

A second kick; the impact so forceful that he could feel his spine shift. Blood flew from his lips to pepper the cement, dribbling down his chin, spewed with the hard force of the breath that tore through his lungs.

"Stop," the female was repeating, her honeyed voice laced with disapproval and disgust, looking down on the bludgeoning from her perch atop the grafitied brick wall. "You have to stop. You'll kill him—and then where will you be?"

"As if I care," the male snarled, gripping his punching-bag by the scruff and delivering another solid, crushing punch that sent the human to the ground. "You_ useless _piece of—"

"I couldn't get in!" The human's voice was high and reedy, choked with blood and bile, but just strong enough to make the abuse pause.

Brawny body crouched; the demon yanked the human's head up by the hair to study him with a deliberate silence. Before the opening vanished, he spluttered the explanation as to why he hadn't been able to complete his assignment and enter the apartment. He hadn't been able to give it before his negative report had resulted in a beating.

"I couldn't get in—there was some kind of shield…"

The demon's head tilted to the side, eyes the color of the blaring, red-streaked sunset narrowed in contemplation. "Warding spells. What happened, exactly?"

The question caught the human off guard, and for a moment he stumbled over words. An iron hand drew back, arcing with the intent to crack his skull wide open, and he cried out, terrified of dying under the demon's impossible strength. "Wait _wait!_"

A hacking cough spat up another teaspoon of blood and a third tooth, a molar, which made the prospect of dental bills loom in his mind. Finally he choked, "I couldn't actually go within three feet of the door, like there was some invisible wall between it and me. I'd find myself turned around and walking away—"

With a harsh bark of something that might have been laughter the demon let him go, allowing the startled human head to smack dully against the sidewalk while he stood and cast a crooked grin up at his companion. "_Weak_ warding spells." Another laugh, hoarse and grating to the ears it pierced. "If his holiness didn't want her found, he should have put a little more effort into it!"

"Well it _doesn't_ tell you how you're getting in. If he's warded the entrances, there's no way—"

"Ah, ah, ah." A wicked smirk was flashed toward the blonde, ignoring the human crawling to his freedom. "Where there's a will, there's always a way, and I've got enough will to sink Atlantis all over again."

She gave him an irritated look, pink-painted lips pursed and voice dry. "That was Leviathan, stupid."

He snarled at her. "I _know_ it was the goddamn Prince."

"How _are _you getting in, then?"

Pure, evil glee twisted the face of the demon male. From the pocket of his leather jacket he produced a single tiny vial which, with a dramatic flourish, he shook delicately in the air until the contents sloshed. The glass was clear, spelled against breakage and leaks. Anyone with eyes could see that the content was a liquid of a deep, gruesome shade of red.

"Know what this is?" he inquired; the slippery, silken texture to his voice so near to pleasure that it was chilling. The color drained from the female's cheeks, leaving behind nothing but the rouge used to create a pretty blush, and he knew she did. "Those flimsy little wards are shit when I have this. There's nowhere she can hide where I can't find her now."

The blue of the eyes fixed to the little container were no longer dulled with boredom. Where there had been annoyance and skepticism, there now lay a shallow layer of uncertainty, implying that perhaps she was not so keen to tamper with a lion's teeth as she might have been before.

"You're not supposed to do blood-magic…it's illegal. We could be demoted—or _tortured_ for this—"

"No one's going to know. I've taken precautions to make sure we won't be caught." He eyed her with a clever perception. "Besides," he added smoothly, "won't it be worth it once you get your fill of the angel's flesh?"

Her protests were silenced, contemplation of worst-case scenarios morphing into the replay of a daydream and fruitful imagination. What might she be able to do with a little time and a push in the right direction? How long had she chased her quarry only to be spurned because of some damned sense of goodness? The entire realm could feel the frustration clouding the air around him; a perfect perfume, just itching for the kind of relief she could give.

How weakened were those unbreakably-hard defenses now? Shield after shield thinned from neglect and yearning. The hardest aspect of him now was that marble body.

"I thought so." The vial was tucked away. "It shouldn't be too much longer until there's an opportunity. I'll send word when it's time. Remember," he snapped, suddenly stern, "ten minutes at the least. Fifteen if at all possible, but I know better than push my luck."

"Ten minutes," she answered faintly, eyes glazed with the pretty picture provided by her own lust. "Of course…whatever you say."

He snorted, but he was satisfied that she might get this, at least, right. She'd wanted the angel long enough now to make her a little desperate; and who knew, maybe the pious featherbrain would succumb. But he doubted that. He didn't give a damn whether she got some ass or not so long as she didn't screw up his plan. All he needed was to get the human girl somewhere hidden, somewhere defensible and isolated so his leverage would be secured.

Without another word, he left her to her dreams.

The minute pile of ash was still there when he checked, bearing the marks of the angel's pretty white fingers searching for traces of evidence to pursue the source behind the attack. He knew without bending to examine the grayed powder dusting the tire-torn grass that the angel's search had been unsuccessful. It was the very reason he had used the _Deacca_ for his test instead of some other, weaker spell.

As to the test itself, he couldn't have been more pleased with the results. Not only was the girl still alive and useful, but her warden had been so distracted by her peril that he'd actually obliterated the evidence of a threat before he had a chance to trace it back to the source.

It wasn't often that something caught Death so completely off-guard.

He stood with a stretch of wiry limbs, the smirk curving his lips an expression both smug and rank with the feral gleam of a predator playing with the terror-stricken mouse trapped in his clutched.

"Soon…" he whispered, turning his face toward the city, the glittering electric jewel; tongue curling around the syllables, delighting in the sweet flavor of the blood he could still taste. The blood that would be his deliverance.

"_Soon._"

...

After a late night during which she had been mercilessly grilled by her supposed friends and stuffing herself with the godly sweet and sour pork from Yin's Golden Dragon, Lilith had been justifiably exhausted.

Despite the general discomfort of the ordeal, good things had come out of the evening. Her friends had collectively accepted the fact that she was in a relationship; which included the shock, the overprotective phase, and finally the gushing, sappy reaction to the farewell kiss from the man in question. This was a welcomed relief, if only because, after a while, the focus of the discussion shifted from her relationship to the other girls and theirs.

But she was still tired, and the prospect of rehearsals after work forced her to ingest what April had amusedly observed to be about half her body weight in coffee to stay awake.

Since it was almost five o'clock, the late-day sunlight was slowly turning warm and golden to dusky blue tones as it streamed through the windowpanes. And it was with some misgivings that she followed an insistent Sarah out to the hurricane-damage zone that was the large meeting room, all of it books and media Sandy was collecting for a display on the Second World War for her book-group. The sprawling piles of information took up the entirety of the three long tables. A mess that was in serious need of sorting.

Yet, as it was Sarah's project to reorganize the pulled items into a legible order, she knew that whatever the problem was, it was most likely to do with the sheer amount of material. But, as it turned out, Sarah had merely wanted to show her something.

The book that was thrust across the table toward her was a one-of-a-kind compilation from one of the resident Veterans belonging to the book club; a charming elderly man who had bestowed the library with the honor of its donation. Riddled with newspaper clippings, journal entries, and hand-written first-hand accounts from soldiers and refugees he had known and met along his deployment, scanned ledgers, missives and photographs; the book was not only thicker than a cinder block and weighed about two times as much.

It was a treasure, holding a special place in the hearts of the staff. It was kept in the fragile documents room, away from public hands except upon specific request for contents it contained, and they watched it carefully to make certain it was never abused, misplaced, or checked out.

But it wasn't the book itself that caught her attention, but the photographs lining the pages Sarah bookmarked and flipped open for her to see.

Though the images were a grayed, green-tinged black and white pigment and of a grainy quality, the face shown was one she knew quite well. She supposed it made sense to keep stumbling across pictures of him, since he'd been around as long as he had; because the man whose military portrait had been pasted alongside a group photo of a mixed American and British army regiment was none other than her very own guardian angel. Looking quite dashing in uniform.

"Doesn't he look like Adrian?" Sarah pressed eagerly, her brown eyes fixed, fascinated, to the stern expression etched onto the firm lines of the angel's photographed face. She pointed to the written paragraphs dedicated to the man Mr. Reynolds (the author, or composer of the book) awarded a generous level of praise.

Lilith glanced at the caption below the photo, which read: _Lt. General Alexander J. Harker. Commander-in-chief – Collaborated Army commission of the 21st Division._ Harker again…she wondered if he consistently carried the same surname when he walked among mortals.

Yet when her eyes slid unconsciously back to the photos, she couldn't help but remember, with a twinge of silent anxiety, just what it was she was supposed to help combat. It didn't take much strain to notice how grayed and unhappy the memory-carved depiction of her angel looked.

She glanced at the hand-scrawled dedication to Lieutenant Harker; a piece composed a few years ago on the anniversary of D-Day, offering information about the battle of Normandy that she had never heard before. Bending her head over the tome, she read with a thrall like that of thirst, drinking in the words of sloppy writing and marveling at what she found.

_-The officers were ordered to stay out of the main conflict – they had their duty to keep communications open and relay tactics via runners to the other offensive points. An important duty, too, even if most of us were terrified of being sent out without the commanders we knew and understood. Harker had been mad as a stuck bull over it, as we'd all seen…but I hadn't thought the Lt. Gen. capable of disobeying direct command from the Admirals._

_We all knew he'd been pissed, not only because he couldn't go in with us, but because – like he told us beforehand – the whole thing was a bloodbath waiting to happen. The man was honest, even if he did have a stick up his ass the rest of the time. But even hearing him yelling at Vice Admiral Richman the night before we were deployed didn't really rank up to turning around mid bullet-rain to see him charging up Omaha beach right along with us. It was the first time any of us had seen him anything but stern with a soldier, too, when he took over for the field-medic whose skull got blown in and talked the wounded through._

_We lost almost two-thirds of the Division, including my best friend Charlie. I got by with a shot up foot and a ruptured eardrum. One of my Charleston pals wound up losing both legs; but it could have been a lot worse. We could have lost everyone, if not for Harker having been out there belting orders like a goddamn tactical machine. Good Lieutenant got a bullet in his shoulder, but he came out pretty good. Good enough to give the Admirals hell._

_I don't think any of us left alive ever really thanked the man for saving our miserable American lives, seeing as we were GIs and not his British boys. But when I look back on it now, I know that every breath I've taken since that day I take because that brave, stubborn, hard-ass of a man put his own head on the line to protect his Divison – to hell with what the big-wigs said._

_There's not a day gone by that I don't thank him now, wherever he is…if he's even still alive. I might have thought he was a stiff then, when I was young and full of myself, but I learned a lot from Lt. Gen. Harker; dutiful and dignified, exemplary far beyond his years, the kind of man who'd tell you he didn't give a shit about whether you liked it or not, you'd get your ass in that rubble and dig for survivors, and then make damn sure he was right down there with you the next time you looked up._

_If ever a man deserved the name of a hero, it's him. I'm proud to have fought under and beside him.-_

Sarah tilted the edge of the book, shifting the cover for another, closer look. "He must come from an old military family...parents or grandparents probably immigrated after the war. No wonder, I thought he was probably from foreign lineage—wouldn't have guessed English, though." She smiled and nudged Lilith in the shoulder. "Just wanted to show you; thought it was kind of cool."

"I'm glad you did," the brunette answered, somewhat absently when she drew back from the book, her eyes still lingering on the hard evidence of the past.

"Oh, lord," Sarah exclaimed, "it's after five. You'd better get going if you want to get to rehearsal on time."

Lilith smiled, offered her friend a quick hug, and trotted across the library to the backroom where she grabbed her things. She avoided lateness only with thanks to her car, though it did take her some time to find a parking space since the curb was so crowded.

It was the first major rehearsal the two schools had yet held; mashing the entirety of the combined student body into the studio to crank out what had been accomplished so far in order to manage spacing, layout, backstage placement and timing. The first and second acts were based around the younger classes, intermixed with some older ensembles and slowly edging into the adult class showpieces. Act three would feature the more thematic (i.e. edgier) pieces.

The younger half of the school would be dismissed before Act three rehearsals began. It was bound to be late by then and the little students needed to be in bed by a certain time. Jessica didn't care how long she held her older students back from sleep, but hell would freeze over before she let the youngsters stay up too late.

Upon skittering into the dressing room approximately seven minutes before her call-time, Lilith was unsurprised to see the room practically empty of people. Bags and discarded clothing were strewn all over the counters and even the windowsill, but it was much more entertaining to watch the other, unseen dances than hanging around in the dressing room. The entryway to the building had been packed with people.

She stripped off her work clothes and shoved them into the crammed shelves beneath the countertop, and extracting her pointe shoes and bag. Donning a thin black t-shirt, she stepped into the hallway and toward the crowded studio threshold.

Lilith didn't begrudge anyone for being in her way. Her fellow dancers were very nice and upon seeing her with shoes in hand and understanding her need to get in and warm up, they made a little path for her to wind her way to the barre that spanned the back wall. She sat herself down in a corner to put on her shoes, pulling back the ends of her tights to tape and pad her toes. Once she began doing up the ribbons, she looked up.

Immediately the reason for the observation _en masse_ became clear_._

The very first thing that popped into her head was: _I didn't know he could use tap-shoes, _which was quickly overwhelmed by the sheer weight of the realization that she had never thought Irish dance to be so very beautiful or engaging as she did at that precise moment.

But she didn't find this very surprising; because it made sense that Azrael would know his way around quite a few unexpected things. She wasn't shocked at all…she was enthralled.

She had helped develop this piece; assisting the younger students (most of them ten or eleven) with their placements and studying the choreography. It was her pet-class, as Jessica had dubbed the relationship between older student in relation to the class level given to them to help babysit. As such, she knew the choreography had been built around one of the adult students' solos, since the piece had been inspired and based off of the Celtic legend of the God of Dance, with some undertones reminiscent of a May Day celebration.

She had never met the soloist whose name had been on the roster. But that name, she was certain, hadn't been Adrian Harker…so she was thrown for something of a loop when she saw Azrael's familiar figure prancing quite gracefully and lightly among the children looking up at him with adoration shining bright in their eyes.

Altogether, she wasn't very familiar with traditional Irish dance or tap. But even without the experience or the exposure she knew how to appreciate the delicate, bird-like steps combined with the sharp accuracy highlighted by the tap of the performers' metal-lined soles upon the floor. Colorful ribbons were twisted and tossed between the boys and girls, the streaks of brightness so very reminiscent of a May-Pole.

She had arrived just at the tail end of the piece. The music ended and the dancing whirled to a dramatic stop, an ending pose that was smudged with the tiniest of fumbles from the angel, who had faked a light misstep (though she was probably the only one to know that). He took it in stride, stood, staged his bow, and began to walk toward the wings, marked by lines of white tape on the floor.

Halfway offstage, he paused to hold out both hands for the children who scurried devotedly after him upon completing their own bow. The wide, happy smiles of the boy and girl who took the offered hands were so purely elated that she wanted to grab the nearest one and hug them like a teddy bear. And urge she curbed by starting her warm-up.

Jessica's parting words to the dancers was encouraging and full of praise, patting several little heads and telling Azrael: "don't worry about the ending. That was excellent for having to learn it so quickly—and thanks again for taking over for Matthew."

He simply replied that he was happy to help, returning celebratory hugs with the small swarm of children mobbing for the chance to cling to his middle, all happy that they'd finished their dance with such success.

Though her feet were moving – caught up in her warm-ups and stretches – her head was angled to watch, her fondness for the little dancers and their enthusiasm coupled by the sudden softening in her heart. She hadn't realized he was so good with children, having never imagined a link between such a wise, time-carved creature and the youth of the earth.

She watched him bid the young dancers, noted the generous affection and warm, patient smiles he sent them, and knew that if nothing else had tied him to her, this certainly did.

With some amusement, she realized that the boys were rather quicker to leave than the girls. The young females didn't seem to want to leave the company of their handsome older classmate; instead they lingered while he exchanged a brief concern with John about technique and gently patted the glittery bun of the little girl still retaining a death-grip around his hips.

Gradually they dispersed, their mothers and fathers calling them back into the real world as they squealed final goodbyes to him until only the one remained. She stayed, steadfast, tiny arms locked about him. When he finally convinced her to ease her grip and sank into a fluid crouch before her, meeting the pair of big blue eyes with his, Lilith could just catch him asking softly, "what is it, Maia?"

"I want to see _your_ dance," she told him quite seriously, the pout on her little mouth almost too cute for words.

The only sign of his amusement was a soft smile and a slender hand extended to cradle hers, the touch sweet and kind. "You will soon," he assured her gently, "and it'll look so much better with costumes and lights. It'll be a surprise, won't it?"

She thought about that before finally giving him a nod. He smiled again and sent her scampering off to her mother, who was quite young herself and blushed when he looked her way.

Lilith didn't look away when he lifted his face to find her gaze on him, unashamed that he'd caught her watching. She wouldn't have missed that little exchange for anything, and didn't care if he knew.

With quick fingers, he unlaced and removed his tap-shoes before crossing the floor to approach her. She was just shifting to rest her heel against the wooden beam of the _barre_, leaning over her raised leg to stretch the muscles in her thigh and calf. "Hello," he greeted casually, propping himself against the space of bare wall between the end of the _barre_ and the shaded window. "You find something amusing?"

She was grinning like an idiot, her feelings written right on her face for him to read, but she merely shrugged, forgetting that only weeks ago such a question would have sent her spluttering for a defense. "Oh, I don't know, seeing you fend off the girls was cute." He sent her a wan smile, chuckling quietly when she added, "I think you might have ruined their teenage dating careers with attempts to find someone to compare with the memory of you."

She changed position, stretching to the side, her tone more serious when she said softly, almost jealously, "I didn't know you were so good with kids." And in truth, she _was_ rather envious.

His reply came as a shrug. "I like children. I have for as long as I can remember, which is a very long time. They're innocent, curious," his smile was reminiscent and wistful, "carefree. Something I was never able to be."

Her pause was brief, caught by surprise right when she was switching legs, and looked at him with something quite close to sympathy. "Were you created an adult?"

Though her curiosity was distanced, she couldn't help but feel herself reaching out to him emotionally, though he hadn't even had the chance to answer. She hurt for him at the hint that he had been born with responsibility immediately weighing him down. What a sad way to grow up.

"No, I was created a child," he thought for a moment, and held out his hand to measure a point about the height of a five-year-old. "Consciously older than a decade for your kind. But we age and grow so quickly, and we develop adult capacity much faster than humans do—much more like animals than people. Human infants are born extremely early in the development process."

Another shrug: "I didn't have much of a childhood. Too much political upheaval to overwhelm it—too much going on." In an instant, he caught the taste of her sympathy and playfully shook a finger at her. "Now, now, don't go feeling sorry for me. I didn't need a childhood. You, on the other hand—"

"Don't change the subject," she admonished snippily and he laughed, observing in newfound silence while she pressed out a few sets of jumps, accompanied by the dull tapping of her canvas- and plaster-encased toes as he let the topic fall.

She didn't want to talk about her childhood with him, and he'd received the hint. It would only make her sad and make him angry, neither of which was productive.

His eyes followed the quick pattern of her feet as she readjusted to her newer pair of shoes, a single eyebrow quirking with a wry kind of interest while he traced the shape of the stiffened toe boxes with his sharp purple eyes. "I'll never comprehend how you can stand that."

Bemused, she looked down at her own feet, compressed within her stiff-toed shoes with their pink satin ribbons. They were Gambas, an English brand, and her favored shoe; tapering her feet into a pretty, flexible arch that didn't quite compare to Freeds. "What, pointe shoes?"

"Yes. They look about as comfortable as a knife between the ribs."

She laughed, "it doesn't hurt as much once you get used to it. Not that I expect you ever will, being a man."

Jessica's voice was lively, if a bit tired, when she called, alerting her to the fact that she was supposed to be getting ready for her rehearsal. "The contemporary pointe piece, Lili," the teacher reminded patiently when Lilith's green eyes remained uncomprehending.

"Oh!"

With a brief, apologetic duck of her head to the angel, she skittered to her starting place in the practice wings with the seven other girls in her ballet class. Her cheeks were pink with a meek blush and she shot a glare toward Alice and Janelle, who were both stifling fits of the giggles behind tightly-clamped lips.

Vaguely amused; Azrael found a space of floor off to the side of the mirror by the stereo, wedging himself between two other male students who made way for him with a semi-crude joke and an elbow in the ribs. He didn't mind, despite the fact that neither of the young men knew just how many of the _cherubim_ would have found their cheek no less than appalling.

The piece was a long one; a series of shorter ensembles sandwiched together by the colorful, folksy music of Aaron Copland's Appalachian series. It was lyrical and evocative, full of graceful arms and beautifully-composed falls with artful, stylistic use of the pointe shoes. The girls bonded and mingled, holding hands, gathering long practice skirts in their fists and telling their stories with an easy dignity.

Lilith, whom he knew was not fond of taking the stage by herself, took to a beautiful aria-backed solo with a soulful passion. Wistful and melodic; the choreography combined her light, birdlike grace with the heavy weight of emotion.

Yet as vulnerable and tragic as she seemed, he realized that her dancing had rendered him breathless under the spell she didn't know she wove. He remembered how adamantly she had wanted to dance, how frustrated she had been when she was slow to learn and how devotedly she had cried and bled to make up for it. Yet when she twirled toward conclusion, the notes of her music softening to match her willowy, yearning reach for her audience, she nearly glowed with the skill she had so long desired.

Even after they had received their feedback and instruction on improvement, he remained where he sat as several of the young men around him got to their feet to prepare for their dance. When the girls went to get water and take off their shoes, Lilith parted ways with them, grabbing her bag and carrying it to where he waited.

She sat beside him, unwinding ribbons and removing tape, and asked, slightly short of breath, "what'd you think?"

For a moment he said nothing, pondering how best to answer. His eyes strayed to the wisps of dark hair that had escaped her bun to frame her cheeks and curl at her neck, to her flushed skin and her eyes so very alive and brimming with joy. His murmur of "_exquisite_" left her lost for words, but her sweet, bashful smile told him just how much happiness the praise had given her.


	27. Cast no Shadow

**Chapter 26  
**Cast No Shadow

Recommended Listening: "Tetsujin" by Don Davis [From The Matrix Revolutions]  
and "You Decide" by Fireflight with Josh Brown

* * *

Many women might have found it thrilling to be whisked off by a handsome golden-haired man to some unknown location under the fall of darkness. In fact, the majority of the women she knew would have gone into fits of excitement when faced with the prospect under influence of romanticism.

Lilith Gandion was not most women.

This was not to say that her companion was any less handsome than the afore-mentioned scenario would have someone believe, because that was certainly not the case. And, in truth, her distaste for the whisking had nothing to do with his looks specifically, but the fact that his peerless face was drawn and narrowed with an apprehensive intensity.

Alert and watchful, he managed to maintain a sense of cool dignity when pressing her back into the wall not even three steps from the studio exit, his stance quite visibly protective. Had he been a wolf, his ears would have been back and his hackles up, ruff bristled and tense. She couldn't see much of his face from where she was wedged behind him, but she could tell that he was busy surveying the passing commuters with that sharp, x-ray of a stare she knew he had.

The rapid flurry of movement melded with his somewhat eccentric physical appearance earned him a few curious glances. Yet the people themselves didn't seem to be holding much of his interest. He actually ignored them; flat out denied their existence, which was something she had never seen him do before.

The way he held himself, however, she definitely recognized. Twice she had witness him go still and guarded like this, and both times had been accompanied by a subtly understood threat to her safety.

She waited in stillness and silence, her nerves humming with a steadily heightening pitch of anxiety, as he scanned the street, pale head sweeping slowly from one side to the other.

She hadn't anticipated him to mutter, "that smell…" and whip around to sweep her into his arms as though she weighed nothing at all. Then he leant down to put his lips to her ear, saying softly, "someone has been following you—the scent is all over the ground."

The idea of being followed was supposed to terrify her. But she found herself incapable of processing for the sweet pressure of his chest to her ribs and shoulder and the gentle brush of his breath to her cheek. Even when he was quite obviously afraid for her wellbeing, she couldn't quite manage to swallow the rush of affectionate response that twisted her mouth dry.

No more time was wasted, no word to prepare her, just his magical will to pull her into the body-warping sensation of instantaneous travel; a lurching not-quite-pain like a fishhook behind her navel and _pulling. _It was airless and compressing, as though she was being squeezed through a tiny passage.

And then they were through, the world realigning itself into the top platform of the stairwell leading down into Macabre Hall, fleetingly familiar as it was after only two visits.

The whisking in the purest, and most literal, sense of the term not only threw her completely off her mental balance, but had her stomach squirming like an eel in protest to being shoved through dimensions. Maybe _he_ could flit across space and time, but _her_ body just wasn't suited for it.

By the time she remembered how her lungs worked and made sure her heart was still beating, she found herself being carried down the stairs and set fluidly on the floor in front of the door guard, where she swayed uneasily on her feet.

Azrael let out a low, terse hissing sound; something that had the density and shape of words for the guard's ears. He carried a restless, almost aggressive severity in his position and in the steadying touch of his hand to her back. She had been under the impression that the Hall was a relatively safe place for her, and to see him still so on edge when out of the open, undefended streets above.

The guard, had empty of his customary deck of tarot cards, was shaking his head, politely declining to let them pass. "I'm sorry. His Highness has expressed wishes not to be dis—"

Azrael's hand lashed out to snag a solid, generous handful of the larger male's shirt, grip forceful and unyielding as he yanked the colossal man forward and nearly off his feet. Violet eyes blackened with a command so potent that it crackled in the air like static. Wordless and almost shivering with power, the angel's focus shifted to rest – in all its complete, piercing glory – upon the man who had begun to deny him.

It very nearly caused Lilith skittering back to the stairwell with a shiver of alarm. A small reminder of the temper he had beneath all that grace and gentility.

The guard didn't seem startled in the least. He didn't even acknowledge the grip that had pulled his muscular, brawny body forward a total of sixteen inches, simply reached for the chain, murmuring, "of course, Your Grace," and stepped blandly aside to let the angel pass.

Swiftly and silently Azrael strode across the threshold, moving so quickly that his motions seemed to run together like oil and paint; his musical voice raised with words she couldn't understand. Considering the authoritative, instructive edge to the tone he used, she could see he would have been _quite_ the military officer.

She stared after him, feeling a little lost. He'd been so light-hearted just a little while ago…what had sent him spiraling into this lucid fit of fierce protectiveness? She hadn't seen any danger, and nothing explained his wordless, muted panic. But did that really mean the threat, if there had been one, was inconsequential? It hadn't before.

"Miss…Miss—" She started with an infinitesimal jerk, and blinked up at the door guard gesturing for her to enter. "His Grace wants you to follow him."

Ducking her head quickly to avoid prolonged eye-contact, she stepped across the threshold and entered the more formal of the Hall's rooms, both nervous and a little flustered.

He had stopped at one of the tables, the only one that was currently occupied; by a familiar silver-haired demon and a small, quite pretty young man who looked like he'd glued himself to the prince's side. A human who, she was amazed to see, had the nerve to glare possessively up at Azrael.

The words crossed between the two immortals were hissing and brittle, a hard, sharp language that brought her a reflexive shiver. She approached the men tentatively and found herself being treated to a share of the human boy's venom, his aristocratic nose lifting with distaste at the sight of her. She ignored him, unimpressed after having witnessed the lightning of the angel's temper.

"Whoa, whoa, slow down a minute—god _damn._" Beelzebub's expression was torn between grim and disbelieving. "He actually left a scent-trail?"

"That's what I said," the angel snapped. He was trembling with energy, almost literally vibrating like a violin string, a strange cross between vindictive adrenaline and a thirst for action as he stripped off his jacket and tossed it into an empty seat. The human's scowl whipped back to him, which Azrael ignored, addressing the prince with a scattered explanation in illegible words.

Though she didn't know what to call it, she could tell it wasn't Heaven-speech; it was too coarse, guttural, coming rough and hard from the throat. Based upon sounds that seemed impossible to imitate, she wondered if the language would tear at the throat of any mortal who could successfully copy it.

His movement almost serpentine, the demon uncoiled his lithe body from the half-reclining position across the seat, worming a fraction of space between himself and his companion. He leant forward and, extending a hand, drew a shimmering, alien symbol upon the air roughly a foot's distance from Lilith's chest.

She took a step back, muttering indignant protests that were drowned out by Beelzebub's answer of: "got it. Go, I'll watch her."

Whirling around, so much like a vengeful wind it was a tiny bit frightening; the angel descended on her, strong hands momentarily gripping her shoulders, voice a low murmur when he ordered firmly, "_raen_—stay." And, leaving her in a state of shocked, scandalized disbelief, he took a step back and vanished into thin air.

For a moment she could do nothing but gape, wordless and stunned, trying to process what had just happened. When she finally concluded that her guardian had left her to be babysat (_again_) and told her to stay like some kind of pet, she lost a significant piece of her composure. Throwing back her head, she yelled after him, not caring that he probably wouldn't hear. "_I am not a _dog_!"_

But he was gone, off to do who knew what, leaving her alone in the bar with a demon and his pet. _Honestly; _was it really too much to ask that he keep that courteous calm for just a little longer to tell her what was going on? But of course not. He had to play the hero and rush her off to safety with that stupid, fairytale whisking and make her wait for his return. Ugh; _men!_

With a soft snort, Beelzebub drained his glass of liquor, dropped it with a muted clink, and addressed the boy who had renewed a clingy grip around his middle. "Scram." The word was mild, neither hard nor gentle, and was met by a disappointed whine of protest from the human so obviously enamored with him. Yet the prince remained firm, quirking one silvery eyebrow and repeating, "Beat it, I've got other priorities for the moment."

Producing what looked suspiciously like a hundred dollar bill, he slipped it into the pocket of the pretty boy's jeans. "But don't go far."

Quietly, and with something of a haughty smirk for Lilith, the young man got to his feet and left, probably heading down the stairs for the prince's office to await their postponed rendezvous.

Lilith silently wondered at her lack of surprise for the demon's taste, plopping heavily into the other side of the booth when Beelzebub made a gesture toward it. "Sorry to ruin your evening," she huffed, "It wasn't my idea."

"That I believe," the demon replied, stretching his legs out across his seat and leaning his shoulders back against the side of leather upholster which curved around the back of the table. "And don't say you're sorry. I can get a lay any time I want, watching you is more important."

He eyed her, noting that her arms were crossed over her chest, her face having embraced a curious meld of disconcertion and downcast unhappiness. It wasn't difficult to see that she was displeased, and Beelzebub had a fairly good idea why. "You look pissed."

"I don't like being treated like baggage," she explained quietly, and she hated how selfish it sounded. The fact that something so petty came from her own mouth made her irritable.

The demon didn't seem to see it that way. In fact, he actually seemed to commiserate with a wry smile tugging at the corners of his lips and a glimmer of understanding in his scarlet-shadowed eyes. "He didn't mean to make you feel that way," he said patiently, "it's the soldier in him; protect the endangered at all costs. If it makes you feel better, he would've stuck around to make you feel better if things were different."

Her eyebrows knit together, the look skeptical and intuitively sharp. "If _what _things were different?"

"Can't really say..." he said vaguely, and she remembered what Azrael had told her about the revealing of information that could put her at risk.

"Of course you can't."

She sighed, unable to quite shrug off her frustration. It seemed like every time she felt reasonably relaxed around Azrael he did something that reminded her of just how fragile their relationship was at this state, throwing her back into the reality that his was a world she wasn't sure she could understand or acclimate to.

"What is he doing?" The question came more harshly than she had initially intended, scraping raw at a sense of insecurity and discomfort that made her want to beat her fists into her brain. It came out weak and needy, not at all like the self-assured woman she so vehemently claimed she was.

Beelzebub sat up, leaning forward to brace his elbows against the table. It was important that she understand why she had been left there, if for no other reason than to counteract whatever poison was being inadvertently spread by the diversion of her guardian's attention from her. She didn't know why she felt so uncertain, why her comprehension of divine secrecy suddenly felt so shaky and uncomfortable.

It wasn't her fault, and considering her unusual circumstances, she was within her rights to feel this way. She naturally sought closeness with someone to whom she was so tightly bonded, and when something inserted a distance in that connection, it inspired anxiety and self-doubt. By obligation, he would do what he could to ease those subliminal fears of hers.

She couldn't possibly have known how dangerous the wrong bit of knowledge could be. Nor could she have known just how vital her acceptance of that fact was. Simply being close to Azrael was a risk to her; her value to him a chink in armor that had been impenetrable for so many centuries, and information could easily split that chink wide open. It was an unfortunate irony that she was so hurt by a distance intended to keep her safe.

He jerked a thumb toward the ceiling, indicating the ground level above the basement-sunk bar floor. "He'll be off searching for whoever's been tailing you. Someone followed you to your studio today—if he didn't tell you—and you're stuck here with me, babe, because he doesn't want to be divided between focusing on_ them_ and looking after you." A curious gravity flitted across his foxy face. "Which I can understand. Just from the bite you got we know this isn't an idle threat."

"I _am _capable of caring for myself," she told him, slightly annoyed by the implication that she was helpless and in need of constant supervision.

The sleekly gelled-back silver of his hair fluttered when he shook his head. "Not against this, you aren't."

"He's probably overreacting," Lilith's tone was argumentative. "You said yourself, he does that. I mean really—who on earth would want to trail me?"

Beelzebub's expression didn't change; face set like glass, golden eyes fixed with the touch of condescending humor at her attempt to turn the situation into something less serious. If anything, that just torqued her even more.

"So, what," she snapped, infuriated by the glance that made her feel so like a child, "he's going to track down some scary person in Seattle—where there are more scary people than a jungle has bugs—and then what? Threaten back?"

With a soft snicker he replied, "Maybe. He's not a bad tracker, as trackers go. As to threatening…" His eyes grew considerably darker with a shadow that stretched across the fine edge of his lips, a look completely devoid of the mischief that usually seemed to cloak his confidant exterior. She couldn't remember seeing it's like before, and it chilled her. "I don't really know."

She was about to let out some sarcastic retort, when he added smoothly: "He told me about the Deacca."

Her blood went cold at the thought of the dog-like humanoid thing that had tried to smash itself through a car door to get to her, and suddenly the idea that there was someone out there harboring the intent to do her harm didn't seem so far fetched. What was it he'd said? _Deacca – a tracker and an assassin. _An assassin. But for what purpose? Who would want to have her killed?

She huddled in her seat, unable to tell if the room had gotten colder or if it was just her memory leeching the warmth from her body. "This whole thing is ridiculous," she whispered, "I'm just a human. I shouldn't need someone fighting to protect me like something out of a book!"

Beelzebub merely shrugged. "There's only one problem with that analysis," he told her as he stood and stretched with a great show of flipping his rocker-styled hair around. "This isn't a novel—this is real. And you can't really put a limit on what goes on inside reality, especially not _this_ reality."

Lilith watched him with wide eyes as he crossed the cement floor toward the bar, empty of both patrons and tenders, not quite knowing what to think of that statement. A part of her was quite shocked by just how much sense it had made to her. Throughout her dealings with Azrael and the protective wings he curled around her, she had always felt safe; but it was possible that this safety had blinded her to the cold hard truth that these threats were more legitimate than she had believed they were.

It was true, her guardian did have the tendency to overreact a little bit, but that didn't make his reasoning any less justified. It wasn't his style to meddle in her life unless he felt she truly needed it. He wasn't the type to approach a small issue with a full set of bared teeth. While he may exaggerate the importance of an incident, persist with questions and examinations even after she stated she was fine, every time it really, truly mattered, he always seemed to be right.

He had once called her fortunate to be blessed with the knowledge about the immortals. To know that they walked among humans, camouflaged and masked by wandering, watchful efficiency the angels and demons used to keep relatively unnoticed. He had implied that it was a gift, something to be treasured. If that was true, then why had she being marked by a stalker? Was it because she knew?

Even with her powerhouse of a warden to keep an eye on her, just how safe was she, really?

Somehow, it didn't seem to matter. He wouldn't let anything happen to her, so long as she let him do his job. Whether she had been a little girl and needed him to shield her from harm, or whether she had been grown and needed him to boost her courage and sense of self-worth; he had never lost the edge that kept her as safe as he had had the capacity to make her.

There came a time when even the most incessant urge to stand up for her rights as a woman needed to shut up and let the chips fall as they would. This was one of those times.

Beelzebub returned, toting two glasses of liquid in varying shades of amber, one of which he set in front of her. "Cider," he assured, tone slightly shallow, and took a swig of what was probably rum or brandy from his own.

She looked down at the cylinder of clear glass, the shine it gave to the liquid inside, and could vaguely see, through the eye of recollection, the tips of pale fingers tracing the rim, forming lazy circles in a vague, familiar pattern. But they were the rings of a halo now, not the links of a chain.

Reaching out, she filled her hand with the sleek fabric of Azrael's discarded jacket, the sleek black cloth gliding between her fingers as she pulled it into her lap. It draped over her legs, a sheet of shine and warmth, but she had eyes only for the glass, pondering in silence with her fingertips to the fabric and the slosh of amber liquid reflected in her pupils.

When the touch of his hand landed upon her shoulder, gripping hard enough to just avoid the brink of bruising, she craned her head back to look at him standing over her, just close enough to show her the oddity to his already strange golden eyes.

It was the severe gaze of someone passing off a dangerous secret, one, she knew, was likely linked to the last he had slipped to her. This time, however, there was an edge of empathy and understanding, an edge which hinted at his wish to help her by arming her with information.

"Remember," he murmured, "some things done in the name of love have a bitter edge. He will kill if he has to—_sin_ to keep you safe." Beelzebub sighed, a gust of breath from immortal lungs raised in the pits of Hell, a sigh that knew very well the depths of the sin he mentioned. "Not that I think we should worry tonight, but it's up to you to ease that instinct, to make him feel secure enough to stay sane as well as pure."

"How can you be sure I can do this?" she asked him, overwhelmed by his underlying touch of urgency, "_any_ of this?"

He gave her a mildly bemused look, studying her expression for a long moment before setting down his glass and reaching for the sheath at his thigh. Though she hadn't initially noticed the knife kept there, she eyed the length of it with some unease when it was bared. "I'll bet you the answer to that. Sebastian!"

At the sound of footsteps – startlingly quiet ones from a man of such size – the door guard stepped inside the bar room, the soft gleam of his hairless head harmonized by the glint of a single gold ring in his right ear. "Yes, Highness?"

"Don't move. Odds that I won't draw blood?"

Glancing between the slightly curved blade held lightly in Beelzebub's hand and the man who, as ordered, remained perfectly still just inside the threshold, Lilith fought puzzlement and an awful dread that trailed along in the wake of comprehending words she was sure she hadn't heard. Before she had time to scream, Beelzebub's arm arced backward and he hurled the knife with a smooth, graceful ease, straight at the motionless man.

The heavy thud of metal meeting wood touched her ears, and she stared, unable to look away despite her surety that Sebastian would have been pierced through and bleeding profusely. But there was no sound of pain, no coppery smell of blood.

When her horror cleared, she saw the knife quivering where it was buried almost hilt-deep in the cabinet behind the bar, a mere half-inch from Sebastian's ear.

Golden, hawkish eyes twinkling with a soft spark of fun, Beelzebub gave her a crooked grin, and told her, "there's this little thing called blind faith. That's how I'm sure. Weird for a demon, eh?" He chuckled at her wide eyes and pale face. "Thank you, Sebastian." With a short bow of his head, the door guard went back to his post.

She glowered at him. "You just did that to show off! You knew you wouldn't hit him, didn't you?"

"Yeah, then there's that…"

"You jerk."

The demon prince merely gave another winning, roguish smile and sprawled across his seat to finish his booze in record time, while announcing that he was going to chat at her about common human misconceptions of the boogey man.

It was an interesting story, if you were in to demonic jokes. But for some reason her attention kept wandering. No matter how hard he tried to distract her from it, she only seemed to have focus for her anxiousness for her guardian to return, and the state he would be in when he did. It wasn't that she doubted his strength, but who or _what_ever this stalker was, it had seemed pretty serious, and she was a worrier by nature. She didn't want him getting hurt because of her.

And then there was the fact that she felt a little lonely, sitting there with nothing but the partly-awkward discussion partner of a hellish male as her only company. But she was determined not to examine that factor too closely. It might have led her somewhere she wasn't prepared to go.

...

He ventured to the street outside the studio for a second time, refreshing the jolt of recognition which had led him to panic. The scent still lingered along the sidewalk, a light musk traced into footsteps that paused just beyond the threshold of the multipurpose building and tracing back from an origin to the south. He checked her workplace next, a sweeping surveillance of the outside parking lot and covered entrance, nostrils flared and lip curled with a silent snarl upon finding a second, fainter stab of familiarity.

The source of the smell had come here first, probably while she had been inside the library, mere flimsy walls between her and the demon he could see was tracking her. Demon, he knew, because the scent carried a subtle, acrid edge of brimstone.

Settled deep inside the wellspring of magic-made awareness, there was something missing in the face of the feral-eyes creature which peered out from the sockets of his eyes. Perhaps it was that sense of warmth and compassion that humans titled in their name – humanity – replaced by the determination of a hunter honed with a thin sliver of vengeance.

He crouched atop the carved overhang of one of the elegant, old-style buildings still left in Seattle, coiled like a beast about to spring. The building was beautiful, with a Greek-inspired pillars and a detailed grace the bustling passersby never seemed to notice, and, for once, neither did he.

Sleek muscle pulled tight under white skin turned pearlescent by the fall of dusk, eyes searching with acutely measured energy and patience. He had no clear direction yet; nothing at which to direct his rage and fear, nothing to curse into oblivion for daring to threaten what was precious to him. Scent wasn't tangible proof of anything according to the laws he knew, but he had a gift for reading and knew that his target was still in the realm, in the city, even; near enough to pin to his crimes.

Azrael raised his head a fraction of an inch, chin lifted to cast his magic-enhanced sight out across the wide expanse of west Seattle like a fabricated, formless net, scanning with a pair of eyes traced with a fresh, dark line of kohl.

The wonderful substance developed in ancient times allowed him to visibly see and trace the use of magic without wasting energy on spelling his pupils. Without it the search would have consisted of following the erratic pattern of physical movement through the city, and who knew how long that would have taken. By the time he reached the end of the trail, the focus could have disappeared. This was quicker, more efficient, and best served the festering need to have his anger appeased.

Day to day the angel harbored a benevolence that concealed hint of a temper; but when pushed the wrong way, he could be a vicious enemy. Not many humans knew of this, and often immortal kind was disinclined to recollect it, but those who had borne witness to his wrath had never forgotten it.

And if being hand-fed hints that his ward was being trailed like a deer for the stalking wasn't enough to fuel that rare-found rage, what was?

Of the six of Heaven's generals, Azrael was charged with direction of the second primary fighting force whose specialties lay under long-range tactics, magical talent, and metaphysical force; over a quarter of the divine military. As the organization of mages was complex, Azrael had perfected methods of strategizing his people. He had learned how to maximize the individual strengths of his soldiers, and he was good at it. But he was best with his own magic.

Most mages possessed skills that were refined to a specific talent – weather control, explosives and fire, warding or protection, shapeshifting, enhanced sight or hearing, among many others. His was not so specified. Azrael was powerful and flexible enough to be able to channel his magic into whatever he needed, which included ferreting out nasty little spies crawling around the humans' streets.

To see beyond the apparent truth, a cover for slyness and illusion, one needed focus and great concentration. With the aid of Kohl, he had trained himself to see through spells, sometimes more efficiently than those with a natural-born talent for sight simply because he was not as vulnerable to other dangers when seeing. He had no need to worry about being attacked for his diverted attention here, however. The demon wanted to flee from him, not fight him.

It was the speed of his travel which ended the search.

Azrael's enhanced vision locked onto a blurred streak headed toward the east, moving faster than any human possibly could. The angel allowed himself a cold, humorless smile, but knew better than to count himself the victor just yet.

His target was far off, moving in a straight path that suggested a clearly intended destination, with plenty of time and space between them to lose his pursuer. Not all demons were sneaky and evasive, but this one, if his assumptions were correct, was; slyer than a fox and as slippery as a snake. He would have to be fast, and above all, he could _not_ lose track of the moving target.

No one noticed him leap from the rooftop, his shadow framed by unfurled wings, to fall twenty stories and land gracefully upon his feet alongside the slowed street below. The people there paid no attention to the silent shape that had descended like a soldier of judgment day into their midst; unseeing or unknowing that he was there. Since the light of day had given way to the moon's dusky majesty, the night-life had surfaced; more willing to concede to impossibility than most.

He preferred the night, unlike many of his kin, and didn't mind the darkness that swathed him like heavy furs, but he had no time to appreciate the serenity or to mourn the smog-lined cloud-cover which closed him off from the precious moonlight. A spectral phantom, he ran; more swiftly than a mere mortal's eyes could follow.

The streets were a dizzying, chaotic whirl, shapeless and circling, but his navigation was keen enough to keep him from getting disoriented or lost. Despite his great speed, however, he had still set off _after_ his quarry.

Through the twists and angles of the older sector outside the reach of wealth's concern, he ran, light and swift, his movements accented with the sighs of invisible feathers which traced delicate patterns along his arms and nape and streaking his hair. The shadow unmatched to his form was a reversion into the past; an echo of a creature that hadn't seen the goodness in life for a great many years.

Like a mercenary unleashed upon a debtor, he raced first east before curving to the south, surveying the ground he tread to trace the dissipating path he followed. Not fast enough. Burst after burst of speed he used to cross the city in moments, to hurl himself toward the intended target. _Still_ not fast enough.

Outside the club, he stopped to appraise the trail that had slunk from the open streets. The dingy windows were grimy, painted over and plastered with posters likened to the crude nature of its patronage, title highlighted in the deep, toxic violet of a blacklight that brought an eerie, glow to his unearthly skin.

His anger flared, knowing better than to believe his quarry had been driven into a corner. The bastard was clever, intentionally hiding in a place where he would be more difficult to see and his smell would be fractured, jumbled with others. But it was also a place that would force his hunter to curb the thirst for punishment. It wouldn't do to put a good ten-score humans in the middle of an immortal dog-fight, no matter how much he wanted someone's head on a pike.

There was no other choice for the time being. He could neither starve nor wait the demon out, since his adversary could easily vanish from the premises without a trace if he chose. It was probably a lost cause, but entry was the only forward option that didn't include blasting the walls apart and having to erase a good hundred memories.

It irked him to have his hand forced by such an obstacle, and he had to remind himself that it wasn't the score of humans at fault for being used.

With a grating sigh Azrael stripped himself with a fluid wave of a hand, exchanging his modest clothes for tight-fitted trousers and a shirt of sheer, clingy cloth to meld with the crowd he was certain to find. He passed by the bouncers with the tiniest thread of persuasion, a color-bleached ghost, and descended a flight of rickety stairs that trembled and shivered with the bass line of music cranked loud enough to permanently dull mortal eardrums.

Not caring a bit for the ideological oddity he made by entering the room, the angel absorbed the blare of lights and color, chipped paint and cigarette smoke, scanning the mass of people that filled the floor from wall to greasy wall for his quarry.

They milled like eels, the whole swarm of them, dripping sweat, the sickly-sour reek of alcohol and basement-concocted drugs oozing from human pores to permeate the air. The assault to his sensitive nose was tolerated with stoicism, withstanding despite the unpleasant weight of the stench impeding on his senses. It did as intended, much to his displeasure, completely masking the demon's scent he had tracked.

A hiss of vile temper slid from his throat upon taking a useless inhale that gave him nothing but a chorus of mixed and melded scents. Yet while he could gauge very little, he determined through logic that the right direction was forward, into the fray, and that he would have to follow.

Immediately upon approaching the writhing mass, he could tell that it wouldn't be possible to weave through without touching. That was just fine. No one said angels had to be sweet and polite.

He pressed the palm of one hand to the back of the nearest person, a young man around twenty in age, and delivered a spark of electricity to shock him out of the way. It worked, sending the human stumbling aside and into his partner. Neither of them seemed to mind, taking it as an opportunity to lock lips, and the angel wedged himself into the open spot, sliding between gyrating bodies in an attempt to keep track of his target, driven by a flash of rust-red that slid just out of focus.

Red…that seemed wrong somehow, ill-fitted to the image his mind had formed. An aura that didn't match the name in his focus.

Yet any hope of fine-tuning this detail was hopeless. His whole endeavor was a lost cause. The tactic was an efficient one, serving as the perfect shield to hide the demon's aura from even his sharp eyes and leaving him struggling to keep his senses clear.

It was uncomfortable to be so closely confined by people he neither knew nor appreciated, his personal space swallowed by the reeling humans. Even behind the consuming veil of drug and liquor, they had enough sense to register that they rather liked the composition of his body. Soon enough, his patience was worn and his hopes of resolution sunk low enough to scrape the cement-reinforced floorboards. He ceased his pursuit, disheartened, and turned to find an escape route.

One last scan of the room yielded no secrets, nothing but the sick sensation of drowning in sweat and secreted human hormones massed into a ball of nausea, rank with too many brands of cologne. The overload of pointless sin struck him hard to the gut, pooling bile in the back of his mouth to sting his gritted teeth.

Against the knowledge of the mortals naturally drawn to his allure, the rough slide of their flesh to his resilient skin left him feeling cold and irritated, not aroused. The smells of sex and waste raked raw at his delicate senses and filled him with disgust. It took more than a few solid grabs and starved ribs to warm his marble composure, despite what their eager confidence told them.

They threw themselves at him as though he had the countenance of a god, panting and pleading, clawing their wanton hands down his chest and standing on their toes to reach for his mouth. Cheapness belied a wistful undertone, greed founded in desperation to drown their insecurities in his flesh. But he denied them, wishing it was another, cleaner, gentler woman offering to ease his pain.

For a moment he lingered, his lips moving so faintly that the words toed the line of silence, whispering with a conviction so pointed and driven that it pierced the sound of the music. "I _will_ find you," he said, an oath to send an involuntary shudder down more than one spine.

Yet unlike the men and women who cooed and praised him with purrs of pleasure and grabs for tender places, the mind of the audience who mattered convulsed with natural trepidation. The scarlet eyes concealed amid the swarms narrowed just slightly, acknowledging that he had been warned.

Throwing caution to the winds and counting on the thick influence of drugs to mask him, Azrael unfurled his shadowy wings and threw himself from the club's premises.

The bite of the air smelled and tasted of winter, tiny ice crystals nipping at his skin as he materialized on yet another empty rooftop, but cleared his head and rid him of nausea. The construction beneath his feet was dusted with a fine frost which crackled beneath him when he crouched, leaning over bent knees to look down upon the club he had forsaken. With misgivings and a low, simmering note of defeat, he settled into the certainty that even as he waited for his prey to exit, there would be no such luck.

It was cold; and while his mind barely registered it, his body reacted, muscle and skin rippling with a reply to the brush of the icy chill that caressed him like a lover's hands.

The earth had an ongoing love affair with the divine, never sparing any expense to attempt ensnaring one of the higher beings to fall to its persuasion. He had always cared for her, the earth and her rich history, what she stood for, but this was not a night he could afford to spend courting her affections. It had been a long time since he'd had that kind of energy to spare.

While many a female would have taken offense to the neglect, she always understood. Besides, all human women were tied to the earth, and his love for one of her daughters was enough attention for her.

Frustrated and feeling denied the solution that had been so close to his grip, he found himself relieved that he wasn't the only one out and about that evening. He had no desire for solitude, even in his brooding, though it was that brooding which momentarily blinded him to their appearance. So focused on his loss was he that he nearly missed the deliberate steps they took to warn him of company.

They startled him at first, their silence giving way only to the feel of their auras, slate gray and citrine green, and two pairs of eyes at his back. He lifted a hand; prepared to fight, almost wishing he could, glancing over his shoulder to eye them and noting the harmlessness they shared. He let the magic gathered at his fingertips fall to dust.

Balael slid from the perch at her bearer's shoulder, Mastema's arm following to instinctually brace her balance upon the edge of the roof without a word or a sign that he cared about her weight, and the little female pranced across the way toward the kneeling angel. The deep red of her shirt draped low across her chest, granting glimpses of form-fitted black beneath, her makeup like ink against her moonstone skin.

"Looking for who I think you are?"

He held out his hand to her as she approached to sit primly on his knee and sling her arm across his shoulders. "That all depends.

Tracing a vinyl-coated fingertip down the curve of his chest, she admired the fit of the transparent shirt, lips twisting upward with a smirk. "Sexy," she complemented, abruptly chirping, "They're _always_ plotting—the little sneaks. With wee goblins in the night and predators to stalk the humans."

The angel's grip tightened about the demon's waist. She referred to the phantom threat that haunted the very back of his mind; that of the potential for conflict between the realms and what conflict tended to bring to the human world. And demonkind always seemed to be tearing at their bonds, eager and yearning to break free and feast upon both the goodness and evils of man.

War allowed for many atrocities to slide beneath the Guardians' watch when distraction kept their keen eyes elsewhere. The horrors featured in mortal nightmares of monsters and devilry had every potential to be real, set to target the weaknesses in the ranks of the angels. He tried not to think of what that might mean for Lilith should her value to him become recognized. Nothing would happen, because he wouldn't allow it.

All the same, if the manipulated Records were discovered to be an act of provocation, it didn't bode well.

"What do they want—to destroy everything and become gods of a memory?" He murmured, gazing down at the frosted streets, listening to the near-noiseless steps Mastema took to approach them.

Balael's gripped sympathetically at her one-time commander's shoulder as she answered, "you know as much as I do, _Süße. _Mayhaps that's all they can imagine wanting."

It was a steady, serious remark for her, wise beyond what most would expect from her and her madness. But her point was both valid and ethical. Hell's constant craving for unrest and chaos drove them to rage against God's rule, yes, but to their own inescapable folly. A gentle reminder that to judge wrongly was to repeat mistakes of the past.

He looked at her, the vibrations of his temper long since eased, and she offered him a small smile and hopped gracefully to her stiletto-booted feet. "Well, I'm off in search of a snack!"

With a grin, a flash of white teeth between painted lips, she sent the two men a charming wave, and took a graceful, running leap from the roof, vanishing in mid-air to join the mob inside. After a few seconds passed by and she didn't return, Azrael knew that his quarry had vacated the area and she had turned to her own sport.

He got to his feet, gracefully unfolding his length from the crouch and turning to his other visitor. No-nonsense and methodical, the demon's clothing was simple and hinted at an understated finery. His mahogany hair had been pulled into a half-tail, revealing the blindfold wrapped securely over his eyes, but his lips were set in a line, betraying a weighty mood.

"It seems as though we were both searching for something," Azrael mused softly, lavender irises paling with a question too risky to voice.

"So it would appear," Mastema replied amiably, demurely tucking his hands into the pockets of his coat. "Though our objectives are a bit different, I'd wager, since you seek a person and I information."

It was no surprise that Mastema already knew for what his one-time pupil had been looking, considering it was he who had tutored Azrael on the finer principles of seeing beyond reality. Almost nothing escaped Mastema's perpetually bleeding eyes. Blindfold or no, nothing ever seemed to blind him – not when it came to factual certainty.

But there were some things that escaped the arts of deep sight, things that could hide in the pits of darkness and overturn illumination.

It was also no surprise to register that the information the Father of Woe was looking for was likely related to the unspoken foreboding of war, in some shape or form. He was only so motionless because he had servants to do the looking for him, if one wanted to count the Sorrows as servants. Nightmares in particular were useful for digging out secrets few might want exposed.

Yet the idea that Mastema saw fit to do such looking out here among humans was not a comforting one. It implied a severity he had hoped might not last, a foreshadowing of hard, potentially dangerous times.

With a heavy breath, Azrael closed his eyes and turned his face to the sky, fleetingly longing for the touch of moonlight to ease his worry. "You think it might come to that?"

The demon shifted subtly. "It's hard to say. Even looking a few moves ahead gets us hardly anywhere."

In other words, more than likely.

Embittered by the thought of fighting and of possibly exposing his charge to warfare, Azrael clenched his teeth and swore.

He didn't know if he had ever loathed the prospect of conflict so much in the past. He had always hated war, despised the useless killing and bloodshed that wore him to the bones and stripped him of will to live. But he could never remember being so utterly terrified for the start of one. Grimly resigned, yes; unhappy, certainly…but afraid?

"Tell me," he said a moment later, brow furrowed by the strain that clouded his mind and thought, "is it wrong to fear its arrival?"

For a while, the demon remained silent, pondering, watching his companion with wise eyes long accustomed to dealing with such heavy questions. Mastema spoke with a cool, quiet certainty when he answered, his solution measured to cut through doubt and unease. "A man who cannot fear is a man who cannot love. And if you love nothing…what purpose can justify that fear?"

Azrael glanced down from the hidden orb of the moon behind its shroud of smog, and gave his mentor a grateful smile.

...

"Wait, wait! Show me again—"

Lilith watched with rapt intent as the demon prince settled the coin against the back of his palm and proceeded to make it disappear for the eighth time in a row. Regardless of how many times she had seen it, the trick intrigued her to no end. She was fascinated that the only thing she could see when his other hand passed over the slice of metal was a faint metallic shimmer, as though a lingering, infinitesimal fraction of the nickel was left behind a few seconds after the spell was completed.

Magic and its common existence were not new to her, yet she stared as though transfixed, almost as though trying to decipher just _how_ the coin had simply vanished.

"How exactly do you do it?"

Beelzebub shrugged mildly, amused by the girl's steadfast focus. It hadn't taken him long to find something flashy enough to snatch her attention away from fretting over her guardian. Just the simple charm used to make the coin disappear after he'd dug out from the crease in the seat cushion had pulled her right out and set the wheels turning, her pragmatic brain working furiously to solve the newfound riddle.

She was so purely concentrated, driven hard by an innate want to learn and understand, on how the trick was done. It was a true sign of one who could – and _would,_ most likely – accept much more by way of unearthly natured things, which only served to bolster his show on the subject of faith.

It was rare to find a human so calm around even this small of a show of magic. Most of them either freaked out and tried to deny they had seen anything or went into crazy bouts of worship, thinking they were going to be smote on the spot. It took a serious amount of pluck to stare in the face of something mortals hadn't been designed to understand, mostly because it challenged the solidarity of everything they already knew upon birth. Once death came, they were usually a little more open to the idea, but before…it was just rare.

She didn't put the pieces together, nor did he expect her to, exactly, but he almost wished he could reach over and give a good hard rap to her pretty head without getting his brains smashed in for it. Honestly, _how_ she couldn't see how perfect a match she was to Azrael was completely beyond him.

He wished the angel would drop the whole gentlemanly act and jump her already.

"It's just displacement of matter. Physics," he told her, wisely keeping his thoughts to himself, and reached across the table to pull the coin out from the air behind her ear as though it had been hiding there the whole time. "See?"

She frowned, staring at it, obviously _not _seeing. "No…"

Tawny eyes flickered upward to a point over her shoulder. "Have your boyfriend teach you. He's better at it than I am anyway."

For a moment she was confused, not following the reason for having been brushed off. She jumped at the sound of soft laughter that came from behind her, disturbing the quiet that had stretched through the spacious room but for their private conversation. It had startled her, the sense of presence shifting so fast that she barely had time to register the benevolence of the man looming over her.

Shifting in her seat, Lilith peered up at her warden, who had appeared from nowhere as effortlessly and silently as he had gone to lean casually against her side of the booth, folded arms resting against the upholstery. She fought hard against the desire to blush upon being caught in such a state of blatant, childish curiosity. It seemed odd to feel guilty for being entertained in the presence of another man, even if she hadn't done anything wrong, but there it was.

The angel had smoothed away the tempestuous mood of before, no longer appearing restless or disturbed. The change was vibrant enough to give him an almost depthless look, as though freshly emptied of feeling, emotionally drained. But through the mask-like blankness, she could see just a tiny trace of annoyance settled into a line at the corner of his mouth, and though it was neither deep nor prominent, she did wonder why it was there. Did it mean his search had been unsuccessful?

He held out an empty hand, elbow bent just slightly, and called softly to the coin, causing it to vanish from the other man's palm and slide smoothly into focus upon his own. "It's not as easy as it looks," he noted absently, setting the nickel at the edge of the table.

His skin shimmered with the movement, coaxing Lilith's eyes to slide over the sheer cloth of the shirt fitted tight to the angel's arm as he reached down and made an inquiring gesture toward the jacket draped across her lap. She had kept it there, not quite sure why she'd been so loathe for it to stray out of reach, and her cheeks warmed when held it out to him.

She stared down at the hands clasped tightly in her own lap while he donned his jacket. It didn't seem fair to be so affected by barely anything more than a glimpse of an arm. It wasn't as though he'd pranced around buck naked in front of her…

_Oh!_ That was _not_ something that should have popped into her head. Her face flushed with heat; shamed by her own valiant attempt not to think; brought by a sheath of transparent burgundy sleekly stretched over marble flesh. The very _last_ thing she needed was to be thinking about her guardian angel dressed in nothing but his skin.

And here she'd been all prepared to be normal and calm around him, not jumpy or neurotic. So much for that.

To Beelzebub's attentive gaze the girl seemed almost flustered, but upon looking more closely he could tell that her anxiety had been almost immediately soothed upon noticing her guardian's return. No more did she appear agitated or worried. Any hope he might have had for distracting her, however, had been snatched right out of his clever hands by the brief slice of accentuated flesh.

She might not have recognized it, but a sure sign of infatuation was a rapt, almost feverish focus. Azrael could have let a single finger hover just a hair's distance away from her head, not touch her at all, and she would feel it simply because her attention had glommed onto him like glue.

And she thought she was resistant to desire? Everything about her posture and expression was a vivid, nigh on irresistible come-hither call; the curved shoulders, shy, downcast eyes, the lower lip pinned between her teeth. It was the subtle sensuality of the innocent and untouched, charming, blushing naivety fit to tempt the wits out of anyone aware enough to take notice.

To them – immortal and male and attuned to sensory perception as they were – her libido could have been screaming at the top of its voice. And the best part was; she had absolutely no idea what she was doing.

Hiding a smile behind a cough, he pretended he hadn't just given her a good once-over – which, had he been caught, would have earned him a smart crack to the jaw from Azrael, who was doing a damn good job of ignoring it himself. How was beyond anyone's guess. The demon prince crossed his arms over his chest and glanced toward at the angel doing up the buttons of his coat. "Any luck?"

"No," Azrael answered, suddenly sharp, the low roll of a growl rippling along the edge of the word to voice his displeasure.

It drew a subtle shiver from the human girl sitting in front of him. She pulled her thick ponytail over her shoulder, combing her fingers through it as if to avoid showing a reaction to the dangerous, lingering mixture of anger and frustration in her guardian's tone.

"He managed to evade me, the snake. Not that I should have expected any less from such a—" Quickly, as if catching what was coming before he misspoke and casting a quick glance toward Lilith, Azrael curbed his tongue. "No, I had no luck. Just the chase of a fool still without proof to support his cause."

Silvery hair glinting like metal, the demon's head jerked toward the girl across the table, who continued running her fingers through her hair. "Is she safe, then—with some hunter tailing her?" Lilith's eyes lifted from the water stains on the wood, her gaze slightly panicked. "I'd give an order to stay clear, but the last thing we need is more attention—"

"I'll have to spell her," Azrael interrupted, and straightened, crossing the floor to the back-lit bar. Lilith's bright, inquisitive eyes followed his graceful form, questioning, but unsure whether it was safe to ask while he leaned over the counter and rummaged around in search of something to aid his purpose.

"Valerian?" Beelzebub inquired.

"If you have it…" the angel made a soft, victorious sound and straightened, holding something cupped in his hand and taking the direction Beelzebub gave him on where to find the herb he needed.

The mortar and pestle, which had both seen better days, were made of an off-white stone that had lost some of its shine, cracked and roughly-hewn with wear and use. But when Azrael set the small, shallow bowl down on their table and dropped a few dried leaves into its hollowed center, it seemed to gain a sturdiness that the frail appearance had masked. The plant itself was odorless, but powdered quickly when crushed with the pestle.

He didn't explain to her what he was doing, and she didn't ask, knowing that whatever it was, it wouldn't harm her. She didn't even flinch when he reached for the zipper of her sweater and pulled it down just far enough to approach the neckline of her powder-blue leotard, making no hint that she had noticed the suggestion it could have contained had the situation been different. The focus in his eyes alone told her that his attention was far away from studying her as a woman.

In a way, it almost made her a little uncomfortable to be under that driven intensity of scholar to subject, so alien compared with the kind of looks she was used to receiving from him. He seemed closed-off, concealed from her, enclosed inside a world she could neither enter nor understand.

Dark green powder dusted his fingers to mark where he touched; he drew a faint line from the hollow of her throat down to the center of her breastbone, a dark smudge against her sternum which ended in a circular rune. A second line trailed from her mouth down along her chin.

The light touches brought a shallow tingling to her skin, and she wondered briefly what he might do if she obeyed the pestering urge to lick her lip clean. Would it ruin the magic? Would he scold her?

In the end, she refrained and remained perfectly motionless, tongue kept firmly between her teeth. She was still unsure of what he was doing, but didn't want to move in case it jeopardized his intentions. Doing so might be riskier than it appeared. The slightest tilt of her head could meld wrongly with the touch of his fingertip and result in something awful. That much she knew about magic – it was strong, and it was unpredictable.

At least to her.

He set the mortar aside and straightened, sparks dancing around his long, nimble fingers as he twisted them into sign after sign, like a language of hands that didn't follow any recognizable structure. It didn't even look like the hand-speech she knew existed and had witnessed in action on occasion. This was something older, earthier, and based with strength to singe the air with the scent of raw, inhuman power.

A flare of spellmarks were drawn into the air where they fizzled and faded, but not to their destruction. The shiver of awareness settled upon her skin like a fine powder, and in that moment she was looking Death himself in the face.

It had been no more than an instant, a mere blink of inquisitive eyes as she peered up the familiar face that, for a moment, looked so very unfamiliar. All she felt was the warmth that passed through her like a ghostly shadow when he touched his green-stained fingertips to her brow. But for that brief stretch of breath, she could have sworn that she had been looking at something ancient, untouchable, devoid of human feeling.

The eyes of Death were striking; rings of deep violet that seemed to echo the night sky, glinting with stars. They were beautiful, but also chillingly cold; imbibed with a streak of something which was undeniably dangerous.

But then, swiftly as a whisper, the emotionless mask was gone.

She found that, while strange, the shift hadn't frightened her. Even looking into the face of something as boundless, nameless, and wise as Death hadn't shaken her fragile mortal constitution. It seemed almost ironic, but she knew that side of him which seemed so merciless wished her no more harm than the side she was knew.

"Beel…if you would be so kind?"

She choked upon a scream when Azrael shifted away, her vision suddenly filled to the brim with the lean figure of the demon lunging toward her across the table, the knife he'd retrieved from the wall clutched in his fist.

His face blurred, like something out of a dream turned nasty, until all she could register was the impending fact that she was going to die, right there, right then; and right in front of the personification of the very element itself. Muscles locked, she could neither dodge nor duck. She merely sat there, stunned and shocked to terror, in wait for the blade to tear right through her throat – but it never did.

Beelzebub jerked backward with an explosion of curses, dropping his weapon as though it had turned around and bit him. An expression akin to pain faded slowly from his features into a snarl of temper while he gripped his wrist and sat gingerly back down.

"Holy _shit_—that fucking _hurt,_ you _asshole,_" the demon groused, glaring quite fiercely at the angel. Grumbling under his breath, he fingered his apparently injured hand, flexing knuckles and wrist.

Dazed and bewildered, Lilith steadied the racing of her heart with deep breaths, positive she had just seen her whole life flash before her eyes in a manner of milliseconds. Only she wasn't sure quite why. Only when her warden bent to one knee beside her to draw a warm, wet cloth across her sternum did she fully realize that she was still alive and unharmed.

She blinked up at him with comprehension blossoming in her eyes. "You just put a protection spell on me."

He smiled at her, the curve of his lower lip smooth with pride. "Yes, I did."

"And I got to be the guinea pig and test it out," Beelzebub snipped, still cradling his hand despite the lack of any sign of true harm. "I think that earns me a kiss, what d'ya think?"

"_I_ think if you try I'll carve out your gall bladder with that pig-sticker of yours."

The cloth wiped slightly more firmly against the curve of her chin, making it clear that the kiss suggested had certainly not been intended for him. Despite the demon's quick assurances that he had been teasing, Lilith understood that while Azrael had known it was a joke from the beginning, his threat of retaliation had been nothing but serious. It reinforced her effort never to make him angry.

"Hopefully this will keep you safe until I find whoever is behind this…irregularity." His expression gentled as he wiped her lips clean, the dampness a mere brush of fabric to bar his fingers from her mouth. "No one who comes at you with the intent to harm will be able to make contact."

"Really?" She lifted a slender hand and peered down at the quite unchanged skin with some surprise.

"That is an affect of the Impenetration Charm, yes," he sounded lightly amused, wiping the stains from his fingers as he rose to his feet. "Are you ready to go?" And there was that mask again, cool and smooth, separating her from him with the efficiency of a solid wall.

She fought the desire to frown regardless of her disliking for the distance he showed her, and zipped herself back into her sweater and coat and asking, "if we walk?" hopeful that he wouldn't squeeze her body through dimensions again.

He smiled again, quite faintly this time, and nodded as he cleared away the mess he had made of the dishes and herbs with but an effortless wave of a hand, and made as if to examine Beelzebub's hand. "As you wish. Wait by the door; I'll be but a moment."

She took the hint and backed off, sliding out of the seat and walking across the room to wait, as instructed, tucking her scarf around her throat. There was no sign of Sebastian, so she had little problem with taking a post just beyond the threshold, bracing her shoulder against the frame of the open doorway.

Despite her relief with seeing her guardian returned and apparently unharmed, his rapid shifts in mood were causing her a bit of concern. Of course she appreciated his perception to the fact that she was tired and wanted to go home and sleep (not to mention feed herself), and that the demon's company never offered a complete sense of comfort. But he seemed so disconnected from her, so far away, and it worried at some inner turmoil inside her.

Yet, she rationalized there was nothing to fret herself into knots over. His search hadn't been successful; he had a reason to be a bit edgy, a result of the backhanded reminder of the nameless, faceless hunter? Or was it something else that was drawing those lines at the corners of his perfect mouth?

It wasn't for her to determine. So, she settled quietly, patiently waiting for her warden to finish with his business and come see her home.

The angel's fingertips didn't spark with visible magic when he took hold of the injured hand, but the magic flowed all the same, soothing the burn and beating back the natural response of alarm that caused pain. Skin and nerves mended, healing with a subtle push of compulsion to hold it in place until the demon's silvery flesh was completely whole.

Withdrawing, Beelzebub's muttered expression of thanks sliding over him, he spoke, his voice built on the foundation of the softest murmur. "Mastema was on the lookout tonight. Apparently there may be whispers of another revolt going around."

The prince's tawny eyes were sharp, but unsurprised. "I know," he replied, keeping his tone low as he cracked the stiffness from his knuckles. "I have some ears and eyes open for news."

"Anything yet?"

"Not a squeak."

A sigh answered, one more wearied than it might have been some hours ago. The overreaching weight of worry was a heavy one, tripled by the added burden of a coming conflict – as if a danger to his personal treasures wasn't enough. Azrael's pale hand raked through his soft gold hair, ruffling the pristine feathers that streaked white against his nape.

"I've got to finish the reconstruction of those records…the sooner we find out what Lucifer's using them for, the better prepared we'll be."

"D'you need more help? Cracking codes, splicing?" Beelzebub's finger rested lightly at the rim of his empty glass, sending a tiny bolt of power streaking through the material and shattering a single inner layer. The iridescent spiderwebbing of cracks was miniscule, a seemingly obsolete display to someone unaware of the kind of control it took to isolate the individual layers of fired glass.

But Azrael shook his head in denial, if appreciative of the offer. "You have enough on your plate as it is."

"And you _don't?_" A silvery eyebrow quirked, accompanying the jerk of a stubborn chin toward the door and the dark-haired girl waiting for her angel.

A tight smile touched expressive lips. "My thanks, but it shouldn't be too long now. I think we have the first half completed, and Cassiel believes it's not quite as dense as it looks, so all that's really left is the final seals and the experimentation."

For a few seconds, the demon considered that, thinking back to all the information Azrael had given him on the makeup and content of the spells unearthed from the old records. The reports had been strange, odd combinations and powerful magics that had wound in circles and led to absolutely nowhere.

Even under the influence of power-boosters and aids for the Sight, the only scrap of an outside clue had been the vision of the past Azrael had relived. That in and of itself had made no sense – not combined with what the records of Iscariot recalled. After all, the era of Christ and the era of Arthur of the Britons had been near centuries apart.

What was the link? What was his father hiding in the scribes' catalogues?

"Are you sure you saw what you saw? You're positive it wasn't something else and the Hemlock just effed you up too good to see it?"

Azrael gave him a look that was only slightly tinged with an indignant touch of propriety. "I was not _that_ drugged," he quipped irritably.

"Yeah, yeah," a hand waved the defense aside. He paused, thinking, touching a fingernail to his lower lip. "But maybe there's more to it?"

Azrael considered the suggestion, his eyes shifting with the prospect of a new angle he hadn't pictured. "I'm not sure. We may have to try again and dig deeper." He removed himself from the scholarly intrigue with a jerking shrug, the fabric of his jacket shimmering, under the harsh lighting from above. "We'll see."

"And the hunter?" Beelzebub's tone was smoothly delicate.

Azrael's eyes darkened, an almost imperceptible hint of steel icing his carven features as he murmured silkily; "I pity the demon fool enough to challenge me."

There was no point in pursuing the matter further. As it was, there was little more the angel could actively do without either breaking a law or drawing unwanted attention to his unconventional ward. But it remained an unspoken fact that whatever this plot turned out to be, regardless of its aim, Azrael would make the perpetrator wish they'd never been created. Truth be told, Beelzebub pitied such an idiot, too.

Making a complacent noise back in his throat, he sent the angel on his way with a comprehending nod and sent Lilith a jaunty wave, who returned it, somewhat uncertainly, as she was guided toward the exit by her exceedingly calmer guardian.

The air still possessed a bite, drawing soft puffs of white from their mouths when they exhaled. Azrael showed no discomfort in the cold, Seattle's early breath of winter, and while Lilith shivered, she tucked her gloved hands into her pockets and found that she could survive the walk.

"Oh! My car…" she began, realizing she had left her poor Toyota at the studio.

"I'll have it moved back to your apartment," he told her smoothly, eyes forward and face artfully blank as he said it.

She paused in mid-step, watching as the breeze ruffled his hair, and wondered why he looked so tense. Reaching for him, she folded her arm around his, which automatically bent to support her touch with an instinctually genteel turn of his wrist.

White lips curved with a gracious, gratuitous smile that put another blush into her cheeks and caused her glance to drop to the sidewalk in an attempt to conceal it.

In another moment, he was speaking, softly and regretfully: "You probably won't see me for a few days. A rather serious matter needs my attention, and while I've been putting it off because I detest paperwork, it's been too long. I really should get back on track." He sighed, and there was weariness in his face, invisible lines of stress that seemed unusual for one usually so collected.

Lilith regarded this with a slight twinge of concern. Was it because of the thing he'd discovered following her that afternoon, or because his search had been in vain? Or was it this serious matter he spoke of that put such shadow in his face?

Yet she thought better of mentioning it, no matter how she wanted to. He probably couldn't explain much, and asking for clarification would only depress him due to his inability to confide in her as he wished. It would do little good to show him her fear. He had taken measures to protect her, which was more than enough incentive to buck up and give him a smile.

And that was exactly what she did, squeezing lightly at his forearm to display her appreciation for the communication and to put her faith forward. "Take your time. Don't scrimp on the paperwork." Her smile was bright and her eyes were soft, pretty green gems in the dark.

She probably didn't notice the catch that hitched his breath when she looked at him like that.

"And don't worry about me. I'll be fine—it's safe enough now, right?" It was a question, to which he nodded, a little stunned by her display of brave nonchalance.

He could smell the fear on her skin even now that the heightened panic of the discovery had faded into resignation. Yet to look at her was to think she was as calm as could be. She was such a courageous little thing, even if part of that show was staged to keep him from fretting, because that in itself was a hint of care which he hadn't quite expected.

With an adjustment of gloves she drew away, assuring him that she could walk the rest of the remaining three blocks by herself, having stepped out onto a familiar street and regaining her sense of direction. He nearly protested, but she looked so confident and upbeat that he decided it wasn't worth the argument. He would return with her car shortly enough to be sure of her safe arrival.

His parting kiss to the back of her gloved hand was accepted with a somewhat bashful smile, and accompanied soon after by a soft plea of: "next time something weird happens; could you give me a little more time to prepare for the space-warping thing?"

Surprise struck him just before the laughter came, warm amidst the chill. "Of course," he promised with some apology. "My memory is somewhat skewed under fire, but I'll try my best to remember."

An odd spark of fondness lit within her, a piece of her that found she hadn't really expected any other answer. Only honesty would make a promise hindered by conditions, and she could understand that he wouldn't swear on bended knee to keep her instantly informed of every scrap of fact if her life was on the line. Strangely, knowing this made her feel a little wistful.

Softly, almost hesitantly, she touched his cheek with the edge of her hand, a light trace that wished she were gloveless and that his skin was not quite so cold. "Goodnight, Azrael," she murmured quietly, and turned with a subdued smile to head for home, tightly wrapped against the cold.

For some time he remained where he stood, watching as she walked until he could just barely see her with a human's sight, the back of her jacket a dark spread across her shoulders to meld with the mahogany shimmer of her hair.

On the outside, his flesh was leeched of warmth, tepid and chilled as marble. Yet while intellect could tell him a tale of cold, dry truth, it didn't change the fact that the graze left by her hand tingled with the blood-heat from her body. Nor did it do anything to still the hard beat of the thrice-cursed heart heavy in his chest.

"Goodnight, my darling."

They said absence makes the heart grow fonder. What a shameless, idealistic understatement.


	28. Born, Never Asked

**Chapter 27  
**Born, Never Asked

Recommended Listening: "Inevitable" by Anberlin

* * *

Echoes of the pain penetrated his concentration with a dull, tingling awareness. It hooked tiny barbs into his focus, striking low at his belly before fading back into silence; deep-set pangs that urged him to drag himself from his work to explore the symptom. The several minutes it took to still the flow of energy pouring from his hands and into the unmarked parchment felt like as long as a lifetime.

He had sat down with the rise of the sun to start on working with the spells, breaking only once to seek sustenance and again to answer a call from a cherub regarding an episode of miscommunication. Visitations postponed for the following day, he had devoted himself utterly to his task. In total, seventeen straight hours had been spent with power surging through his veins.

The spells that had run down his arms like water had been subtle, finicky ones. Such complex combinations of marks and delicate weaving patterns were fussy enough to have flustered an angel with an ounce less patience than his own.

The first of their copies had been completed the other day, and now they were neck deep in the process of duplicating more. Cataloguing and coding the individual spells that had been placed on the original document would allow for more thorough examination; and the more copies they had to experiment with, the faster they would be able to decode and dissolve those spells. Then perhaps they might unearth the purpose for such seemingly pointless magic.

And still, after so much toil, they had a long way to go in recreating the spelled documents recovered from His Majesty, Lucifer.

When Azrael finally severed the link between his spiritual consciousness and his project the throb hit him again, harder and deeper, with no distraction to cut the brunt force of it. But the hurt wasn't his own. It was too shallow, too faint, which led him to a single logical source; Lilith was in pain and his protective monitors to her wellbeing were alerting him to it.

His vision blurred in time to a subtle twitch of fingers against the smooth, sphere of crystal seated beside him. Seeking with the ease of familiarity though he was, the trance of location remained hazy as it passed through the barrier between realms, until he found her. She was lying across her couch, curled beneath a blanket, her eyes closed; and the connection was smooth, not pinched with her fear.

She looked reasonably well, well enough not to inspire haste, but the care he had for her desired certainty, if only to locate the source of that pain.

He split the magical link and rose to his feet, swaying briefly beneath a tiny surge of unbalance. The switch from primarily magically to physically active was mildly disorienting, but especially so when undertaken so rapidly. One hand clutched at the nearby latticework, quite sturdy regardless of its decorative nature; the silver and agate structure held his weight as he gathered back his wits.

He regained visibility and balance quickly, but a sliver of annoyance struck him upon the discovery that he was sweltering due to his exertions. Even the fluctuating core temperature of immortals, designed to regulate heat and cold to displace discomfort, could still overheat.

With a sigh, he released the lattice and crossed the spacious room to tidy up.

It was a beautiful chamber, and of anywhere in the three realms (excluding whatever ground his ward walked), it was by far his favorite place to be; all graceful archways and lifted ceilings, openings in the walls which led to wide balconies. The furnishing elegant and graceful, traced with feathered designs, welcoming in its vibrant and colorful comfort. He called it home, and a far more nurturing one than his Hellish rooms. Very much like the eyrie of some great bird.

He even had a nest; a circular mass filled with silk pillows and the utter luxury of woven blankets as soft and fine as spider-spin. It was elevated only slightly from the floor and reached by a shallow set of steps, a complement to the floor cushions and tables much too low for any type of chair.

The water from the basin at one of these tables was cool and clear, greeted with enthusiasm by the flush of heat within his skin as he splashed his face. While it didn't quite quench the heat, the liquid formed diamond-like drops which slid down his neck and shoulders, each one a bead of something soothing and gentle. With a soft towel he wiped away the slough of sweat and water from his skin and began a quest for a clean shirt.

Most of what didn't smell like salt and herbal stains were of a cut and style mortal kind hadn't seen in many a decade. But somehow he doubted his charge would mind. Thus, as he left the apartment, he pulled one over his shoulders, neglecting to lace the collar shut.

Due to the fact that the main thoroughfares were largely devoid of walls, the pillars, arches and vaulted ceilings were segmented by mere air, and light was always in abundance. At the moment, there was a rosy twilight misted with the white of cloud and the glass-like like sheen of the nether.

He had just circled around the Annex, which housed the formal audience chambers and meeting halls – presently empty due to the quiet hour – when he was hailed by Cassiel from one of the connected hallways. The guardian wasn't alone, either, and Azrael's greeting extended to Cassiel's companion; silvery-skinned Moro, a female of the Hasmalim rank and, in times of strife, one of his soldiers. She regarded him with a faint smile, her fur-lined wings shifting gently as she in her own greeting.

"Do you want me to keep working on the reconstructions?" Cassiel's deep tone was subdued, but not hushed; the patron angel of the hunt and the moon had no reason to be excluded from conversation between two of her commanding officers.

Azrael nodded briefly. "If you have time, that would help," he replied, already making as if to continue walking, "my door's unlocked."

With an inclination of his dark head, multitude of tiny braids swinging gently; Cassiel left his general in Moro's company, who continued to regard Azrael with a quiet, searching kind of contemplation. Before he could inquire, she was reaching for her belt and extracting a long, thin needle-shaped weapon very similar in guise to the Japanese senbon.

It had the silvery shine of silver, but he knew from experience that the material was bone, hardened and treated with stardust to give it a consistency very similar to a nimble metal. They were intended for throwing and hurt like hell when they pierced flesh, for stardust mixed with the heat of shaping turned into a poison that irritated rather than killed. Even when pulled out, the substance lingered, burning like a fever.

She held it out to him with a mute reverence, indicating that he should take it, and he paused in his step to reach for the elegant weapon. "A gift," she told him, "in the hopes that she never has to use it."

It was no surprise that Moro sensed that his unusual charge was more to him than something to guard. Likely she could smell the affection and the worry on him. He hadn't expected the support of someone that usually seemed so vapid of emotion, but when he thought about it, it seemed somehow fitting.

"What a generous gift," he murmured, "thank you." There was little point in denying that he would rest more easily knowing Lilith would have such a handy magical weapon at her disposal. What was more, the needle was compact and light; it would only take the faintest scratch to slow down an enemy.

Moro left him with a shallow bow and a smile, the warmth of which had been only slightly unexpected.

Darting gracefully along the halls, he entered the pillared, circular transport room; passing beneath the intricate ceiling designed with swirling patterns of porcelain and glass that filtered the fading sunlight which echoed the earthly sky. There were dappled spots of color upon the floor, oranges and golds and pale pinks, mirrored in the water filling the shallow bowl. At the center of the room, upon its plinth, he submerged his face into the paper-thin quartz.

The world shifted about his body, his flesh dissolving and resolving into shape. It was a smoother transition by far than it was from Hell due to the lack of barrier spells, and within moments he found himself standing upon the carpet of a softly-shaded living room.

The sun was setting here, too, but the progression wasn't quite the same. Dusk came more quickly on the mortal plain, and the sun had already passed the horizon to bathe the outside streets in a bloody burgundy. Though the artificial lights dotting the city were visible from between curtains not yet drawn, the room around him was lit with a gentler glow. Everything around him had been touched by the soft gold from the lamp beside the spot where she lay.

How he had missed her, even after such a short span of days.

She was prone upon the couch, her knees bent and her head pillowed upon a rolled up blanket. Her gentle, heart-shaped face – with its gracefully sloping cheeks, delicate nose and charmingly stubborn chin – was smooth and peaceful. Her skin was flushed and tinted with a rosy gold, sable dark hair woven into a sloppy braid. The comfortable pajamas outlined how very slim and dainty she was; light blue plaid flannel and fine cotton an affectionate embrace to her sweetly curved figure.

Her eyes closed as if in slumber, yet her breath didn't have the slowed cadence of sleep. And judging by the curl of her other arm around her own stomach, she was still acknowledging some of the pain he had felt ripple in echo across his own flesh.

He didn't know quite how she could feel him before he made a sound, yet her eyes were sliding open to meet his gaze as he crossed the floor to approach her, silent upon the carpet. It must have been attributed to the way she was so specially attuned to him, as she had been when she was a child. She blinked up at his concern as he laid the back of his hand against her cheek.

Though his skin was far warmer than its normal cool temperature, she was flushed beyond normalcy. For a moment he wondered if she had a fever. Yet the smile that curved her mouth and brightened her inquisitive green eyes seemed to pierce through the worry, and it was impossible to deny the immediate flare of tenderness she inspired.

"Hello," she greeted; her tone lightly questioning, genuinely inquisitive and curious as to his reason for being there. Not that he'd ever needed a reason before.

A reply wasn't given right away, since surprise had crept around the affection. Bordered on puzzlement, he murmured, "you were in pain…" as if that alone explained everything.

Once she seemed to put two-and-two together, her smile softened with a mixture of affection and pleased incredulity. His heart ached inside his chest with tribute to just how lovely she was in flattery and in pleasure, and the reaction startled him. Where had such a vehement splurge of feeling come from?

The sound of her voice drove the tiny spark of unease out of his mind when she reached up to tentatively take his hand, holding it gently against her cheek and saying softly, "it was nice of you to notice. I don't get cramps often, so when I do they're pretty bad. But I'm fine."

Violet eyes blinked, the meaning behind the explanation escaping him completely for the sheer distraction of her blush beneath his touch. Suddenly she was burning, a flame even to his overheated skin.

"Cramps?" he echoed, combing his brain for the answer, fighting to counteract the sugared scent of lily that seemed to be permeating his senses. His eyes lowered to the fragile white arm she had draped across her middle, caution pricking the confusion and the odd, almost hypnotizing draw of the smooth bare skin. "Your monthly," he murmured, realizing then why he could pick out the earthy smell of blood from between the complex layers of her perfume.

And then he pulled away, sliding his hand from her grip and taking several steps backward, careful not to collide with the coffee table as he did so. It was a quick back-pedal, swift, but lacking a speed that might have alarmed her, intended to insert a generous distance between them.

She frowned, her brow furrowing with hurt and reproach, and as she sat up, angling her bent knees to one side, her voice had taken on a sharp snap. "I'm not_ contagious,_ you know."

"No, you misunderstand," he was quick to explain, eyeing the hand that still seemed to burn with the heat from her grasp. "It's better if I keep my distance for now."

A damn sight better. That had been close…too close. She had been reeling him in and he had hardly noticed his restraint start to slip.

Of course, it wasn't her fault, but a woman on her bleeding cycle was a woman with more hormones and allure than was good for any male to face, let alone a male as susceptible to her as he was. Starving and weak-hearted, he would be easy to seduce should she try. That wasn't entirely the problem, either. The _problem_ was that she probably wouldn't try, but the response would be the same. She might entice without even intending to.

He sat very slowly in the chair across from her, making a physical note to keep his breaths short, shallow and through the mouth, and folded his hands over his lap. Yet despite the forceful effort to remain calm and collected, his gaze lingered on her as though he didn't possess the will to do otherwise.

It was like a dog tasting blood; and he had just had a good, long lick. Scent and taste were very similar, after all. She probably couldn't imagine just how hard it was to keep his eyes from wandering passed her face, to trace the softness of the figure she was hiding under her clothes, warm and ripe with the signs of the moon's hold over her slender body. How easy would it be to peel away that layer? How easy would it be to coax the thin cotton up across her stomach, over her shoulders and lily-white arms? How easy would it be to free the drawstring at her hips and slide the flannel down her thighs to the floor?

Would she fight him now that her passions were already naturally beginning to ignite, or would she lie back and let him, arching and pressing, sighs at her throat and his claim on her lips?

_Stop _right_ there._

He ripped the thought from where it hazed his mind, along with all the tantalizing snippets of imagery that came with it. The sharp mental shake was just enough to snap him back into reality, whereupon he realized that his fingers had curled into the hem of his shirt, gripping the fabric almost to the point of tearing. And that she had asked him a question.

"I'm sorry, Sweetling—what?"

Her brief pause was enough to tell him that she had noticed the roughened, ragged edge to his tone. Once again he had to yank hard on the leash to quell the instinctual response to the knowledge that she had grown so accustomed to his speech patterns. Who would have thought it would be such a turn-on? Yet he silently cringed at how crude that seemed.

"Why is it better?" she repeated, and it was her turn to display concern, though it was more of a pretty, doe-eyed curiosity that peered at him while tucking her bangs back behind one ear.

"Because I've always kept a distance during your bleeding…" It wasn't enough and he knew it. Yet he hesitated, unsure of how to word the reasons to defend the necessity for space. It was difficult to explain, not that he'd ever tried before, but for all the languages he knew, all the countess words and dialects, he found them all useless. How did one explain a magnetic attraction of that magnitude without appearing vulgar?

The syllables weighing heavily upon his tongue, he finished the statement, dreading her reaction and feeling cursed by his own vow of honesty. "You smell too good."

"I _what?"_ she squeaked, stunned with disbelief, the lacy fringe of her lashes drawing dark edges to highlight the bright green eyes that seemed to lock him swiftly to the spot – a butterfly trapped beneath a pin.

It was difficult to keep from flinching. The harshness to her tone had affected him more deeply than he would have liked to admit; yet she seemed more incredulous than anything else, uncertain as to how to process the answer now that she had it.

"But…" She began slowly, haltingly, a small crease between her brows, visibly trying to wrap her brain around the concept. "But it's blood and—and _fluid_. How can that be anything but nasty?"

The faint disgust and the stark curiosity she thought to be morbid brought him some amusement. It told him, if discreetly, that she wasn't offended by what he had said. Rather, she was merely showing confusion; not anger, not fear, not even the trace of being disturbed as she probably should have been.

Her disbelief was challenged by the facts she already knew to be truth; via combination of Beelzebub's confiding in her and her own realizations through experience. She knew he was attracted to her scent, but she simply couldn't cross the line between the normal, everyday smells with the one that accompanied something she viewed as almost entirely negative. It wasn't naivety, nor was it ignorance, necessarily; merely difficulty labeling and processing as neatly as she wanted to.

The emotions warred behind her face; uncertainty with flattery, with confusion, with a desire to understand, and he read them all as they flickered within her eyes. He found her hesitant curiosity to be not only endearing and something of a pleasure to face.

_That,_ however, wasn't necessarily a good thing. Not at the moment.

"You have to understand that I'm not as human as I seem sometimes," he reminded gently, delicately rearranging his position to adopt a more comfortable seat.

His skin still felt suffocated and feverish, and perspiration was starting to resurface from beneath the stifling weight of his shirt. The rigid posture he had unconsciously adopted upon realization of his charge's ailment had diverted the willpower from his attempts to cool down from the exertion of his spellwork, enough so that it required force to relax.

"It may seem unpleasant to you, as it might to another human, but to me," he visibly weighed the details of possibility to include in his explanation, the pause the delicate flutter of a bird's wing. "To me it smells like woman. Like warmth and earth, luxury, white chocolate, and…" The second pause was heavily imprinted with hesitation. When he gathered his reserve it was with a decisive integrity to finish smoothly: "sex."

Truth be told, she looked nowhere near as shocked as he had expected. While her eyes did widen, she neither shrank away from him nor reeled with outrage, merely stared at him with a bewilderment that might have suggested he had three heads.

"I smell like _sex?"_ she repeated, and it seemed that her voice had risen just the tiniest fraction in volume. She wasn't sure if she had heard him correctly, and probably hoped she hadn't, but he was quick to both repeat and reassure.

To give her a sense of his perception toward her concerns, he gave a calm incline of his head. "It isn't so much the substance itself that attracts. It's true that we—immortal males—are more attuned to the subtleties of the scent present during a female's monthly cycle, as any animal," a soft, quiet peal of ironic laughter that chimed like a gentle bell, the sound dancing upon the air as lightly and sweetly as a note of song. "Except for humans, it seems. But part of the instinctual draw is the appeal of what your bleeding represents."

When he looked back up at her, his expression was somewhat sad and his eyes dulled by a muted gray. She bit her tongue against the unconscious slide of discomfort that came from knowing that her _perfume_ (for lack of a better term) was increased during menstruation and what that might mean, in favor of silence. Although, once she considered it, appreciation was far better than aversion.

"Immortal women don't bleed, and it is extremely difficult for them to conceive." He shrugged, and it seemed to be a deliberate step away from that separate topic which had brought him the small touch of sorrow and her a faint ache of sympathy. "The reason your—_fluid_—is such an amplifier of attraction is because of the link to creation. Only human women can bear children so easily, and we—_I_ find the mix of frailty and power to be…"

Briefly Azrael seemed to struggle with a suitable term, yet eventually he succumbed to what was the most effective and the least vulgar in making his point. His voice was so cautiously hushed that she unconsciously had to strain in order to hear him whisper, "Enticing," and the word fell with a quiet sigh that was close to wistful.

She remained silent for almost half a minute, only to shift her body on the couch, pushing back the blanket and propping herself against the back of the upholstered cushion. "You're serious," she stated softly, and it wasn't a question, but an awakened note of realization.

And now she knew, more clearly than she probably ever had before, just how near he was to the breaking point. She knew that he was inches away from snapping, losing all inhibitions and morality and succumbing to the wicked, devastating desire to cross the distance and drown his better sense in the promise of her warm, delicate flesh.

Oh, how good she would taste, gasping and flushed, frail little hands on his skin and the flutter of her breath against his tongue—

"Lilith," the sound was ragged and sharp, "close your legs!"

Startled, Lilith pressed her knees together upon an immediate instinct to obey the orders given with that lovely voice roughened by moods she hadn't the adjectives to describe. Yet the action itself brought her guilt to life. In tandem with the sudden whiteness of the knuckles gripping the arms of his chair and the tightness of his jaw, the squeeze of her thighs brought her a dawning glimmer of understanding.

As soon as she realized what had happened she was stumbling over her anxious apology, chirping rapidly: "I'm sorry—I'm sorry! I didn't do it on purpose—"

"I know," he sighed, passing a hand over his face and pushing the loose hair back from his forehead. His discomfort was as clear as a streak of black paint; mirrored as in imprint within his averted eyes and the breaths he took, shivery within his throat. A coiled silver spring, forcing itself deeper inside the safety of its confines.

He knew very well it hadn't been her intent to lure him. Knowing that didn't fend off the results; he was irrevocably provoked – being one of the tamest of the terms that came to mind.

She smelled like the first breath of springtime, just when the fragrance of the flowers began to reach the peak of symphonic perfection. She smelled like clean air flecked with crystals of ice and streaked with sunshine, cream-lightened coffee, the familiarity of warm, fresh bread, and the faint, coppery tang of blood. And there was nothing about that subtle, integrated scent that didn't reach inside him and _pull. _

It was more than chemical, more than circumstantial. He had never been so enraptured by scent alone…and it was a powerfully compelling sensation. While it was possible to block at least part of it from the rapt focus of the craving that was clawing at the wall of his resistance, there was only so much that could go ignored. Unless he wished to vacate the premises, leave her unharmed self to her own company and flee.

In truth, leaving might have been a better choice. Yet he felt obligated by care and by honor to answer whatever questions she might have, reluctant to leave her to such an alarming concept without a buffer of time and proximity to ease its intensity.

Thoughts torn, he lingered, breath short and shallow, doing his damndest to ignore the whisper of the sweetness lacing the oxygen he shamefully relished simply because of what it caused him to feel. When he heard the shift of her clothing against the upholstery he unconsciously braced himself, guarding against being caught off-guard a second time. She merely rose, exercising a great amount of care, and stepped into the hall.

"Do you want a glass of water?" she called to him, and he was shocked by how calm she sounded. "You look like you could use one."

"Thank you," he called back, grateful for her sensitivity to his discomfort.

There was no doubting she had been startled by his confession. He had felt the uncertainty and dismay grip her heart, but she hadn't said another word, as if she didn't think it worth anything more than a bit of surprise. He would have thought it a more difficult concept for someone so adorably prude to accept gracefully, but apparently that wasn't the case.

Considering her distaste for anything remotely lewd, and how blunt he had been, she was taking the whole thing remarkably well.

The sound of the water running, a cool, clear rivulet surging from the faucet, drew his attention back to the state of his still overheated body. He noted it without surprise, understanding that the renewed strength of the flush was due to tapping into magical reserves to keep himself in line. Those magical reserves that were beginning to run low.

Long minutes had passed since he had ceased work on the reconstruction project, but it hardly mattered. The violent resurgence of his inner shields and the bestial ferocity of the war being waged inside his chest counteracted any hope of easing the physical repercussions. Even shrugging the shirt from his shoulders to catch at his elbows barely soothed the suffocating heat.

It was agonizingly evident that he needed to watch every move he made until he could escape.

If only he had _wanted_ to escape…

Her footsteps were padded by thick socks, falling with something near to silence upon the carpet, close enough to be blocked out by deep thought. He was practically startled by the touch to his shoulder, wondering how on earth she could have snuck up on him – a feat which had always seemed impossible for a mortal, as full of sound as they were by nature.

It took a sliver of measured caution to keep from jerking out of range; he was so far lodged into the depth of analytical thought. It was there, in that instinctual world of cool darkness in which he could safely curl up to study his faults, nurse his guilt and the knowledge of his sins. Yet he managed it, the stillness and caution to keep from leaping back like an alarm-stricken fighter caught unawares, with a forceful reminder that she was not a threat, and lifted his eyes to see her holding out the glass.

His reasons for slipping half out of the shirt had been logically founded. But under the soft touch of her all too familiar gaze, so shyly, sweetly appreciative and delicate with unrealized captivation, he sincerely regretted having done so.

The brush of her skin to the arc of his shoulder brought a lightning-sharp chill to the base of his spine, a reaction that should not have been so strong when initiated by such a meager amount of contact. The pull between them whispered with an allure than felt as solid as friction, warm and smooth as silk to velvet. With a sudden, fluid flash of concern, he realized that he wasn't entirely certain he could withstand it.

She had only touched him out of concern, but that only seemed to worsen the situation. When she showed him favor at a time like this, it was just another panel of shielding stripped away, useless to protect her.

Wrestling with the ache of longing which gripped at his heart and squeezed, he shoved the impulses back and reached out with a brutally controlled hand, he took the proffered water with a nod that was just a little stiff. His fingers gripped the clear, cheap glass so tightly that he worried he might crush it. But the material withstood, and the cool slide of the liquid down his throat was worth the pin-prick moments of doubt.

As though the water served as a translator, the focal point of his worry shifted from himself and onto her. He lifted his pale head to look at her, reaching out with a thin, inquisitive tendril of magic to coil loosely around her middle. "Your pains—?"

"I took an Aspirin," she shrugged, "I'm ok. They're not so bad now."

Still she hovered, twisting her fingers together where she stood slightly to his right; strangely tense for reasons he was unable to piece together. Shamed by his own dread, he thought perhaps something in his tightly-strung demeanor had alerted her to the truth, but the set of her features was not wracked with anything remotely similar to fear.

Finally she eased some of the ambient tension by seating herself on the edge of the coffee table. Yet it wasn't quite enough to relax him. There was a remaining layer of pressure stretched between them, stemming from the somehow very significant lack of any word from her about how much his statements regarding her scent had unnerved her. Such unspoken acceptance sparked the question as to whether her trip to the kitchen had truly been to mask a knot of alarm.

Yet he watched her with caution lining his eyes, attempting to discern the cause for the protests and resentment that he should have received by peering into her emotional aura. The delicate, fluctuating weave of feeling was unexpectedly luminous, shining brightly enough to resemble a dying star.

Surprised, he examined the prominent streaks of curiosity and attraction as they mingled together with shyness and wonder, their colors as dynamic as the boldest and most beautiful of sunsets. Yet there was not a trace of the disgust he had anticipated, not a shred of the panic he was already accustomed to and prepared to counter. He had not expected her to let her immediate shock slide so quickly or gracefully.

Judging simply by the way she seemed to be gradually drawing toward him implied that the flame of fear had long since blown out. That was a good thing, or so he tried to convince himself. But the tentative fascination in her green eyes as they traced the structure of his rigid torso was lit with a spark of something far too close to yearning for him to interpret as platonic.

She actually appeared hypnotized by the unveiled expanse of his skin – skin which, he realized, she had only seen so much of once before, and briefly. Her eyes were fixed to him as though bound by magic, pinned into place. She stared with an unrestrained intensity, somehow captivated by the smooth contours of his chest and abdomen…as though she was imagining what it would feel like to lay her hands against the firm, heated flesh laid bare beneath her gaze.

Was it enough to blame her monthly cycle and the rush of chemicals? Somehow, to the proud twist of triumph that uncoiled from its prison within him, clawed hands curling over his shoulders and raising its piercing eyes to drink in her flushed cheeks and sweetly parted lips, that single detail seemed dangerously, delightfully inconsequential.

Her words came with a hesitant lilt, a hint of bashful notes to acknowledge that she had been staring; but the question was spoken so softly it seemed as though she hadn't intended to give it voice.

She would never have done it normally. Perhaps his whispers of guilty fondness or the way he watched her, half with the troubled concern of someone waiting for a delayed but inevitable lecture and half with the stalking intensity of a hunter. Whatever it was, it drew the inquiry from her with the murmured, unintentional slip of her tongue. As gently and prettily as a note drawn from the string of a violin.

A question so many had wondered, yet few ever had the chance to answer.

"Why do men have…"

She couldn't even finish it; the last word lodged at the back of her throat to choke her into silence. Yet she didn't seem to notice. Not like he did. He knew immediately what she meant, guided by the pointed warmth of her gaze, even without the flare of warning that rose when she lifted a hand, dreamlike and tentative, to reach toward him.

Had he been wiser – had he listened to the sensible sliver of judgment screaming for him to move – he would have been out of the chair and on the other side of the city within the split second it took him to gauge what she was doing. But the other side of him wasn't so keen to flee, no matter how well he knew she was too innocent to comprehend what exactly that single innocent thought could do.

But beneath the shields, between the cracks split deep into his being, he longed for that touch. He thirsted for the contact, a link to the woman who had sunk her roots so deep into his heart that he couldn't possibly have dug them out. And as vehemently as he condemned it for his wish to treat her properly, in the end, this was the side that won.

The tips of her fingers brushed the shallow swell of his chest, a tiny, grazing touch across a place that was, purposefully speaking, pointless to the male race. That place which was the intended focus behind the inquiry that still remained incomplete. That awful, wonderful, sensitive place he had long forgotten until that moment and, to human knowledge, had no reason for its presence upon a male body.

Although he had intended to answer, his attempt was delayed, mainly because his teeth were gritted against the rush of pleasure that he had to work harder to silence than he ever had before.

A hiss scraped at his throat, his fingers curling into upholstery and crushing miniscule cracks in the glass whilst pressing his spine into the chair to prevent himself from arching into her hand. While his eyes were tightly closed and his muscles clenched tight to disable movement, it took every scrap of willpower to stop the vivid, impulsive craving to snare her around the waist and yank her across his lap – to hell with the consequences.

Somehow he managed; all with thanks to the honed discipline that fought to overcome the beast that tore at his safeguards. To his pride, he proved stronger than he had given himself credit for. The layers of shielding he shoved between them as a last-ditch protection held strong.

"Please, don't…"

As though startled by the rough-hewn rasp to his voice, she snatched her hand away, guilt and surprise sparking in her sweet green eyes for the second time that evening. "Did I hurt you?" she asked him, and it was so genuinely sorry that he hadn't the heart to scold her for the chafe to his defenses.

"No—" He began immediately, trying to alleviate the blame she felt. But then he sighed, correcting, "yes," because he couldn't settle for dishonesty with her.

Eyes sliding open, he showed her the deep blue that had flooded the violet of his eyes, displaying the amorous mood that she had unwittingly triggered, to which she bit her lip; concerned, apologetic and unsure of what to do. The smile he offered was small, but genuine, but he shrugged back into his shirt regardless of her retreat, not caring if his body gave out due to heat stroke. Displaying skin only hindered him.

"It would be the same if I touched you," he told her, careful to soften the edge to his voice. "It feels good—which is the reason for the construction, to answer the question. Nothing more complex than physical stimulation."

When her eyes widened with comprehension, when she understood the suggestion of what she had done, she pulled away as though to give him space, clearly struggling to content with the awkwardness that had settled over the room. Yet he wasn't angry with her. He was a little rattled, but that hardly seemed important when – as he noticed with a shrewd level of amazement – she wasn't recoiling from him with the resurgence of disgust.

The silent, repentant timidity that cloaked her was based in concern that she had somehow caused him pain. Emotions roiled, stormy and vibrant inside her aura, but there wasn't a single flicker devoted to her own self-preservation, not a hint of her paranoia raising its head to drive her away from him. Perhaps that was what made him feel even more poisonously atrocious than he had before.

The poor child; so sincere in her worry for his welfare that she didn't know to protect herself. She was so comfortable with him now that she didn't think to fear for herself, when it was now, more than ever before, that she was in such extraordinary danger.

He had some nerve to sit there before her after having dared to meddle in her neat, tidily ordered world, comfortable as it had been, and manipulate her into thinking she could tolerate him. Into thinking she might even regard him with anything close to real affection. Riddled with self-disgust and wishing he could purge himself clean, he turned his face away, too ashamed to look at her.

But Lilith's thoughts were not following the same path.

As plagued by concern as they each were, she didn't have a single shred of thought to spare on his hint that she was anything but safe. All she could think about was the assortment of misguided ideals she had preached and swore to until she was blue in the face; all the awful things she had said, the abuse, insults and convulsive argument.

And she couldn't stop the bitter, empty chill telling her just what an idiot she had been. Horrible, lead-weighted guilt curled inside her chest, growing and swelling until she thought it might consume her from the inside out. Until she had no choice but to speak. The apology wouldn't let her rest without being released, burning at her, insistent that it be set free to patch and resolve the lingering crack that still gaped between them like an open wound.

"I'm sorry about what I said before…"

While he seemed nonchalant and weary, she knew he understood. Yet he shook his lovely white-blond head by way of response, obviously to lessen the sting of the blame she piled upon her own shoulders. "I know why you said the things you did, and I deserve it. All men do once in a while."

"_You_ don't," she insisted, disheartened by his acceptance of the condemnation she had once hung around his neck like a noose. Her stomach sank low enough to drop out of her range to feel, choked by such a calm, tender refusal to pin her responsibility to the coldhearted words she had used as a merciless spike through his care and kindness.

Maybe she hadn't known better at the time, but that was no excuse to have thrashed him so cruelly. She was close to misery with regret in regards to the way she had treated him, enough that her shame seemed beyond any measurement, beyond her ability to bear.

When Azrael's timeless eyes settled upon her face, she found herself startled by the sheer amount of strain he allowed her to see. The veil of peerless perfection slid aside for one brief moment in time just to show her the extent of his agony, his torment. All of it; from the moment he had first laid eyes on her as a little girl crying for her mother to now, desire warped from paternal to romantic, which he saw as something of a heinous, disgraceful crime.

He truly felt responsible for having helped her fears along, but how could he? Why should he carry the burden of her foolishness? Because that was who he was. It was his nature to cherish and please and protect, and because she hadn't allowed him to do his job – hadn't let him warm her cold heart – he had turned the guilt back upon himself.

Because he felt he should have done more to earn her trust, more to ease her fears, more to fight the desires he couldn't ignore.

Lilith imagined she could see the self-disgust seeping from his white skin, the little she could still see beneath the slivered gap down the front of his shirt. He hated himself for the attraction, the sense of need, and the way he responded to her, body and soul. He hated himself for having ever looked at her in a way that was beyond platonic; dirtied, base, human, comparable to the men who would have senselessly abused her for their own pleasure. She saw it all…and dearly wished she couldn't.

"I'm no better than they are. Corrupted and lusting—" He was barely able to swallow the snarl which bit into his words, the hiss of his own disgrace hushed in order to keep his voice soft for her benefit. The effort he exerted to keep from frightening her caused his voice to tremble. "I can't help myself from wanting to have you—"

When he choked himself silent, firmly shutting down the hinted notes of despair, she felt the tears begin to sting at the corners of her eyes. Composing herself, she rose from her perch at the table with a harsh snap of impulse, reacting to the frustration and dejection that marred his beautiful face, blinking rapidly to clear her misty eyes.

She ignored his muted noise of protest, ignored the way he pressed himself into the spacious chair as though cornered, and wedged herself beside him.

Squeezing into the space between his firm, powerful body (tense as it was) and the chair's comfortably padded arm, she glowered at him, her green eyes allowing no argument despite the glitter of unshed tears. The glare she mustered was fiercer than any she had ever yet managed in her life. "You are _nothing_ like them," she asserted harshly, her voice shivering with uncontrolled passion, "Because I am not afraid of _you._"

Then, not caring a whit for the alarm-stricken pallor of his eyes, she wrapped her arms around him and crushed herself to his torso until the space between them had been diminished.

He stiffened beneath her embrace, muscles tightly strained under the slim fingers that fisted into the fabric of his clothing and the pretty face that pressed against his shoulder. Panic raced through his veins, ribboned alongside the blood and searing heat that flared beneath her touch.

Knowing the danger, he didn't dare take a breath. He kept his unnecessary lungs motionless to silence the beast that so desperately wanted a taste of the rich, fertile flesh clinging to him as though terrified of letting go. Yet a mere moment passed before he calmed, steadying himself with a controlled thought of the love for her that warmed him; the lonely, suffering angel who was so touched by her display of faith.

But he didn't completely comprehend her meaning until she whispered, brokenly and worn with the jumbled mess of fragments she was trying so hard to understand; "I don't want to be afraid anymore."

The moment the words parted with her lips, he knew she was his. It wasn't that she offered him ownership; but the admittance, the way she had said it, the way her face nuzzled against the sloping curve of his collar as his pale cheek brushed the part of her hair and his arm slid carefully around her back said it all.

Even the way her sniffles soothed into quiet, tired and stressed from the emotional upheaval combined with the hormones and physical pain. The tears she had forced herself not to shed and that stained his shirt with salt when her body grew heavy and her grip went slack. All of it was a message. While indirect and unspoken, he knew that she was bound to him, and nothing he said or did was going to change that.

Two weeks ago she would have shied from him, stricken mute with terror. Tonight she had faced not only her own demons, but his as well. And she had emerged victorious.

When her breathing grew rhythmic and deep, slumber wrapping around her like a cocoon of shelter and soothing oblivion, he lifted her from their seat to carry her to bed, lungs held tightly sealed against any trace of the perfume so slyly enticing him to take a bite. She snuggled closer in her delirium. Her arms tightened around his neck and her mouth brushed a feather-soft line against his chin, blind and accepting, her murmurs so near the coo of a dove that it brought a smile to his marble mouth.

As he lay her down upon her mattress and eased her grip from around him, he whispered a soft spell for reassurance and for sweet, quiet dreams.

Curling into a tight ball and clutching at her pillow, she sank into the depths of sleep. He drew the blankets over her fragile form and touched the briefest of kisses to her cheek before taking his leave.

Only when he ventured outside and met a face-full of cold autumn air did he let his lungs reopen, breathing deep to wash away the longing and the luscious aftertaste of desire. Perched upon the rooftop, accompanied by the spirit of the nighttime and the waning moon just barely visible behind the smog-laced cloud cover blanketing the sky, he let the cold drive the fever from his body and summoned the notes of a song from where they lay idle, waiting at the back of his mind.

Soft and warm, he cradled the music in his throat as he watched the night pass him by, unable to trace why he lingered there, the hum of the song lilting and sweet. It might have been a lullaby, or something very close; a hymn reminiscent of the violin strings he could nearly feel vibrating beneath the callous at his fingertips.

Perhaps it was foolish, but he couldn't help feeling lighter than he had in a length of time that he couldn't measure. Years had gone by, decades, even millennia, and he couldn't remember feeling the kind of hope that now wrapped around him with the kiss of warmth unusual for his cool immortal skin. He felt reenergized, refreshed, as if some old, festering wound lodged deep inside him was just beginning to heal, stitching its ragged pieces back together.

He felt _reborn._


	29. L'avvento

**Chapter 28**  
L'avvento

Recommended Listening: "The Howling" by Within Temptation

* * *

It was a dream the likes of which she had never experienced before. And considering that it wasn't the first time she wondered whether seeing a therapist might be a good investment that was saying quite a lot.

For all the strange scenes she had watched while her body rested, this one was on a separate level from what she was accustomed to, because it was incredibly sharp, detailed, and crisply real for a descent into fantasy created by the mind.

She had seen rooms like this in countless books and films, worlds away from the here and now of everyday American life. From the kind so gaudy that they couldn't be anything but breathtaking in that classically sumptuous kind of way, to those humbler and softer, without so much pomp and glitter. But this one, for its tasteful glamour, was different.

The crown-molded walls held hues of darkly stained pine paneling highlighted with touches of gold paint, the drapes were velvet and rich, thick scarlet, pooling upon the gleaming floor in artful puddles of fabric quite near to black. Yet from the intricate candleholders casting their dim, moody light to the antique-shaped couch upon which she sat, there was no outward hint of time. There was neither stamp-marked period style nor hint of the hour; as though the very meaning of timelessness had been imprinted in that scene.

Her hand smoothed against the plush velvet seat of couch, admiring the lacy pattern that flowed like fish-scales down its length. Golden tones backed by a frame of dark, delicately carved cherry wood. When her fingertips brushed satin, her eyes slid to the folds of the skirt with draped from her hips down to brush the floor; a blue of such depth that it looked like a piece of the midnight sky dusted with winking stars.

The touch of a hand sliding against the small of her back startled her, and she instinctively shrunk into the corner of the couch. Strong fingers curling about her wrist, but the man who suddenly sat beside her smiled, though his face blurred and streaked when she tried to assess its details.

His grip was gentle, polite even, yet there was something in the way he pressed nearer, his black, gold-trimmed suit brushing the froth of her gown, seemed covertly ominous. Something that hissed like a snake into her ear with a deathly, warning rattle.

Not quite certain why she felt so threatened, her hand snapped out to strike him, an oppressor in the guise of a gentleman. Yet when she made contact, it was to tangle her fingers in the soft length of his dark hair. It was as though her bones had broken free from her will. No matter how she tried to pull her hand back, to keep her head from tipping back to bare her throat to a descending mouth, the wishes of her terror went unheeded.

The pale space at the curve of her neck was treated to a smooth, searing cold kiss. It coaxed a strangled noise of protest from where it was wedged deep at the bottom of her lungs, yet his grip firmed at the taper of her waist, heedless, or uncaring, of her quickened pulse.

It felt strange to feel her own body arch into the mouth that trailed delicately downward, without any thought or command from her to cause the movement. It was eerie. Yet she was helpless to stop it, locked away from her own control, unable to shove away from the cool, unhurried lips brushing the soft swell of her chest. Teeth grazed her skin and her hand clutched automatically at his shoulder as though to brace against an impassioned swoon she did not feel.

Was his coat wet? It was damp beneath her palm, with something thicker than water. Somehow she pried her hand from where it rested, lifting it to stare, bewildered and alarmed, at the red fluid dripping down her fingertips, realizing that his suit had never been black at all.

The familiar, coppery smell of it permeated whatever had torn her mind from her body.

And that was when the pain came, quick and needle-sharp to the swell of her breast, finely-pointed teeth sinking into her flesh as though it offered no more resistance than butter.

She struggled, shoving at his shoulders and tearing at his hair, panic flushing her with adrenaline and fear. But her hands slipped, wet with blood, until she was forced to admit that not only was he too heavy for her to fight, but that she had no grip with which to push away. The points sank deeper and a thin tongue slid across the tiny wounds, drawing the drops of blood into his mouth in time to the thrumming purr which echoed deep in his throat. The sound delighted by her fear and the taste of her blood to wet his lips.

_Something wicked this ways comes…_

Waking as sharply as she did seemed to snap something inside her, for as soon as she sat up with a lurch, she was lying quickly back down to soothe the harsh pounding in her temples. She lay there for who knew how long, utterly still, attempting to shake off the lingering effects of dream-woven terror.

Terror from a scene that had been as real as the tooth fairy.

All the same, there had been an odd but undeniable flavor of familiarity to it, to the injection of helplessness and fear that had streaked through her tendons like a fresh flame. Yet while it had rattled her, but most nightmares were like that. It was nothing to get worked up over. Regardless of that tiny inkling of warning which continued to prickle, and went ignored, at the back of her mind.

Gradually the remnants of unease began to fade and Lilith drifted back to sleep, quiet and peaceful with the soft rise and fall of her chest. Her breath was calm with the stillness of slumber and the certainty that she was safe.

But that was not completely true.

Flickers of hint and warning such as this had come to her before, and not only in her dreams, from a source far off, as convoluted as it was distant, blurred and hidden away. She hadn't yet learned to recognize which flashes were stitched together from imagination. Or which might save her life.

Unbeknownst to her, the shadows lurking in the night outside her window were of an unnatural sort. Yet how was she to know that the soft mock-down of her pillow was tainted with dark intent, or that the veiled glass looking in was haunted by specters she hadn't yet seen the like of?

She had no way of knowing that upon the grass just outside, flickering like ghostly eyes, a ring of thick candles had been lit with flames of a livid orange. A bowl sat in the center of this circle, raised on a ceremonial dais of vapid air. It was steaming gently, despite being both empty and with no fire to heat it.

Beside the shallow collection plate of malcontent stood a man. The quivering light highlighted skin streaked with the red-brown mixture of soot and cayenne that had been smeared down powerful arms, chest, and back in harsh, angular patterns and brought a molten spark to his deep-set eyes. Eyes which lingered upon the thin glass vial held carefully, almost tenderly, in one stained hand.

The wax sealing its cork melted upon an unspoken command, pooling upon the cement in a sticky red blob which burned and blackened the surface beneath it. With a quiet pop, the cork fell from the glass to be scorched into ashes by the boiling wax.

As if with invocation, he raised his arms to the darkened cloud-strewn sky, chest swelling with power that shivered around him like a void of flame. He overturned the vial to empty a thick crimson liquid into the bowl, as though it were a drizzle of honey over something decadent and sweet.

"Begun by blood…" He whispered, the hiss of ritual magic sliding along his throat.

A pungent, caustic stench of burning seared the night air, bringing a toothy smile to thin lips and causing slit pupils to flare with delight. Dipping his stained fingers into the bowl, he traced the bloodied digits across the thin woven band tied tight around his bicep; black cord twisted with a tuft of blackbird feathers and what looked suspiciously like the bleached white of bone, which was immediately dyed scarlet by his touch.

"By blood undone."

He shuddered, his muscles convulsing beneath the magic that warped around his body like a current until it seemed to permeate every inch of his skin. But the bite of the dark spell's strength pierced the ones intended to shield, conceal and protect, so weak in comparison to the battering ram of his intent.

He knelt, touching his fingertips to the grass, and as though by a silent breeze, the candles went out, leaving tendrils of smoke to twine in place of flames.

With that touch, a wave of magic radiated outward, insubstantial, unseen ripples upon a flat surface, splitting the weave of spells which guarded the girl inside to fragments. He could feel them splinter, feel the threads spun and bound with such care and tenderness fray and crack beneath his force. Relentless, he tore at the wards until they could give no further, and they lay in shredded tatters.

His howl was of victory, low and animal, glinting with the shine of sharp white canines; the sound a composition from the stuff of nightmares.

Eyes the russet red of old blood flickered upward to fix upon the window, dark and veiled by white curtains hemmed in eyelet lace, their irises narrowing with the grin curling his lips with wicked glee.

Absently, curiously, he lifted his fingers to his mouth and took a delicate taste of the blood cooling upon his skin. A second shudder rippled through him, flushing with power and an assortment of lusts that cooled the gleam of vengeance from his eyes, just long enough to reveal a slim glimmer of appreciation.

"Such a sweet little thing," he purred, and cleared away the remnants of his ritual with a lazy wave of a hand and a bark of laughter.

Yet he neither ascended the steps toward the fruit of his labor nor made to leave, but stood, waiting for the morning to come. He cloaked himself from sight to stalk his prey from the ground below, waiting for the arranged moment when he could take the unsuspecting dove into his claws and snatch her from reach.

It would do no good to take her now, when even shredded wards might alert her protector to whatever reaction she might have to him. But he need only wait a little longer. A little longer and his plan would be put into motion, and payback would be sweet upon his tongue.

* * *

Throughout the day Lilith had the strange, unnerving feeling that she was being watched.

The first occurrence had caught her off guard. She had been conferring with a Page about the far too-crowded picture book shelves, deliberating whether to call their head children's librarian for a decree or to just start pulling duplicates, which was the normal procedure when there was no more room.

"The answer's going to be same as it is every winter," Rachel said, leaning upon forearms crossed over the handle of a cart. "Should we just go ahead and start pulling?"

Sliding one of the many copies of a Dr. Suess book from the crammed shelf Lilith flicked through its pages, dipping into the nostalgia from childhood's pool of remembrance before setting it down. She agreed with Rachel. Every year November through December people started returning more books than the library had the capacity to hold at one time and the solution never changed. "I think so. I'll go send Jill an e-mail."

Turning to head for the back room, she took a few steps and paused. The tiny hairs at the back of her neck prickled with a shallow chill that seemed to work its way down her spine like a drop of liquid. She glanced instinctively over her shoulder for the unseen eyes, but when she looked there was nothing there.

Shrugging the oddness off, she continued on her way, slipping through the staff door and taking charge of a computer to type up a quick report of the decision for the librarian. But the incident was not the only one of its kind.

Not even an hour afterward, when on a quest for staplers, she was again struck by the eerie tingling at the base of her nape.

She had turned, the high, thick tail of her hair swinging to brush her shoulder, green eyes flickering across the seating area along the wall of windows along the west end of the building. But it seemed her mind was playing tricks, because there were no eyes on her. All the same, she was unnerved by the sensation of being observed and examined which continued to creep up on her throughout her workday.

At the risk of appearing both crazed and paranoid, she battled the recurring sensation with the power of logic, because she was fairly certain she was only projecting leftover fear about her supposed stalker. And projected fears were nothing to be alarmed about. Nothing was jumping out of the shadows at her; it was just a funny feeling, and while paranoia may have had its uses, like spell-check, it had its flaws.

By the time she was shrugging on her coat and gloves, she had herself convinced that the mysterious feeling was from a familiar source, weird as it was to think of it as a reality instead of a childish fantasy.

She had seen neither hint nor hair from Azrael since yesterday – the fateful final day of her period – and it was strange that it seemed like such a long time has passed. After the dialogue, she worried she had pinched his comfort zone too tightly, wondering whether she had forced him into withdrawing to recuperate. But apparently that wasn't the case. The belief that the touch was from her guardian banished most of her concerns.

What she didn't consider was Azrael's consistent habit of taking measures to make certain she was never startled by the weight of his unearthly eyes on her. This was different and some part of her knew it, though she buried it beneath wishful assumption.

With a wave goodbye to Rachel and Theresa as they all parted ways toward their respective vehicles, she unlocked the door and tumbled into the seat, happy to be driving again. As soon as the ignition caught she cranked on the heat. Truly, it wasn't such a cold night, but chilly enough that the hum of the heater was a welcome comfort during the short trip home.

It was full dark when she pulled into her allotted parking spot neatly tucked under the eaves of a protective roof which connected to the staircase. The streetlamps were bright and yellow, casting long, heavy shadows across everything their halos deigned to touch; dark gold on the brick-red outer walls of the building. The street, quiet and somewhat out-of-the-way, was empty.

When the disconcerting chill came again, she was very aware of her isolation. It made her nervous, which forced her to realize that there was something wrong, because Azrael's presence didn't make her anxious. Not like this.

Despite the trill of worry she didn't deem it reasonable to fly into a panic just for a bit of wrongness. Quite calmly, she made her way up the stairs and down the hall to let herself in to number 204. She stripped off her coat and, forgetting she still had her shoes on, trudged into the kitchen to brew a good, strong cup of coffee.

That was when she noticed something on the counter she had missed that morning, after oversleeping and rushing to work in a haze; a piece of paper and something else. Something shiny and silver, like a piece of unadorned metal, a token left by her guardian, perhaps?

_Lilith;  
__This was given to me by an associate for your use._

That was as far as she was able to read before there was a knock at the door. Instantly responding on habit, she retraced her steps to the entryway and tugged the door open to look out at her visitor.

Why she had done it without first looking through the peephole, she would probably never know. It was one of the stupidest things she could have done, opening her door to someone she had not expected at nine o'clock at night, and yet, despite the wisdom she usually would have harbored, she did it anyway. Whatever she had expected, it certainly wasn't what she peered up to see.

A man's face, lean and carved, handsome with sharp, pitiless edges, looked back at her. He had hair the color of blood-rubies, a pure, _real_ crimson with none of the orangey tint of a human redhead's, bright and loud against the nondescript, off-white wall behind him. The burnt orange of his t-shirt stretched to fit across a chest belonging to a brawny, powerful body concealed beneath the supple, deep brown leather jacket slung over broad shoulders.

But none of this held her focus. What caught at her memory and her breath in a way that was more horrifying than she had thought possible, was the deep orangy fire of the irises that blared down at her, the carven mouth with its panther grin.

The color drained from her face and she shrunk instinctively away from the spark of recognition darting into her, echoed by the scene replayed in her subconscious. A dark place filled with the stench of sweat and alcohol, flashing lights, the pulsing pound of music without melody and a texture without a name. An inhumanly strong hand curled around her wrist, the sharp, pointed teeth which sank into the veins beneath her fragile skin. No will to protest; nothing but an instantaneous reflex driven by fear and the inability to understand.

This was the man who had assaulted her, whose teeth had pierced the skin of her wrist, whose presence had driven her guardian to the intimacy of rage. The man who had been tailing her. The truth of it hit her full-force when she met that catlike stare, as her nose took in the smell of ash interwoven with a coppery, metallic taint entirely too familiar.

"You remember me," he noted, appearing pleased. "Good—"

Upon a panic-quick lurch of impulse she slammed the door against its frame. While she threw her weight into the bolt to lock it shut, she knew it wouldn't be enough.

It was easier to see him for what he really was in the light, without the blind swath of darkness to soften uneasy truths and fool naivety into seeing what it wanted her to see. Yet knowing what he was only made it clear that no meager human-made door was going to keep this demon out. She may not have known what he wanted, but she didn't need to in order to recognize the danger.

White and shaky she backed toward the kitchenette, driven by an overwhelming instinct to hide herself as quickly and silently as she had the means to, and hope to god it would keep her safe. Ideas flashed through her head, a segmented jumble of white noise, scattered bits of information that had no consequence, no meaning, and absolutely no value. Because most of them were merely imagined scenarios of the multitude of ways she might be about to die.

Lilith had fled halfway down the hall when she stopped, wild eyes flickering toward the counter where he gaze rested upon the bit of metal. And, more prominently, its pointed, razor sharp ends. She had no idea what it was, or its intended purpose, but even she knew a potential weapon when she saw one.

Snatching it from where it lay next to the unread note she bolted for the bedroom and pushed open the window. She already knew there was no way she would make it out to the fire escape and down to the ground before getting caught. Neither did she have a way to call for help, as her phone was in the car. The plan was a chancy one but she couldn't think of anything else that might work.

She just prayed the cold air would be enough to mask her scent which, according to the immortal men she had encountered, was strong enough to betray her.

The splintering crack from the front door made her start. Her heart beat like a tiny living thing on the brink of combustion inside her chest, and she knew that he had either broken the door down or smashed the lock. Neither promised anything good.

Moving as quickly as she dared, she scrambled into the adjoined bathroom, ignoring the light switches and leaving the door cracked just as wide as she dared. She knew better than to shut it. Doing so would only rouse suspicions of her presence there, and that was one thing she absolutely did not want, much less now that she could hear the weighted impact of the demon's footsteps on the linoleum floor of the hallway.

A _demon,_ hunting her like food for slaughter and sport before devouring her whole…if that wasn't enough to make a person weak in the joints, she didn't know what was.

It was evident now that her meetings with milder-mannered denizens of hell had lulled her into a false sense of security. Not all demons were laid-back, nonchalant mischief makers content to wander among the living to pass the time with diluted means of entertainment; in fact, most were nothing of the sort. Those were likely to be barred from the realm, not that it had stopped this one.

Vaguely she wondered what manner of demon he was, what kind of power he had. What he wanted with her. But thoughts such as those proved too frightening to ponder for long.

Ringed with frantic white, her eyes were fastened to the tiny crack of light visible between wood and hinges, breath bated and motionless. Her grip around the thin needle-knife was slippery with sweat and she feared she might drop it, so she adjusted, securing trembling fingers, straining to both hear and see in the dark of the bedroom. She did her best to keep her breathing shallow as her heart pounded into her ribs, praying for a silence her human lungs would never find.

"Hide if you like," he called, a distinctly, maliciously amused note to the tone. By the mute to it, she could tell he had passed the bedroom door, most likely lingering to study the living room before turning back to it. "But I _will_ find you."

She sucked in a breath.

While the room was illuminated only by the streetlights outside which made it difficult to gather a sense of what was going on, she could see the demon enter.

He carried his movement with a weight that she could guess was feigned. It gave him a sense of slowness, almost tricking her into believing she could flee, rush behind him as he strolled across her carpet toward the open window and dash out the door before he could react. A clever tool, the technique of a master of the hunt, but she knew better than to fall for it. Or perhaps she was just too petrified to even consider running.

Despite the pretense, she recognized the same peerless immortal grace she had seen before. Everything within the stalking saunter of his gait was wound with the sly focus of a predator's patience.

Cloistered deep inside the dark bathroom, she peered through her peek-hole to see him pause at the wide window and the bench situated beneath the sill. The cushion was strewn with books from the pile she had toppled in her haste. Only his profile was visible, leather-coated back and the tousled mane of hair redder than a rose, while he stared, motionless, at the scene of staged escape. She could almost believe she heard the deep slide of the air into his throat and lungs, carrying clues in the shape of smells and tastes.

Her eyes had closed only from the briefest of instants. Yet when she opened them, he seemed to have melted out of sight, leaving her crack of vision empty, and for a fleeting instant, she played with the notion that he had abandoned his search, that she was safe.

The rattling slam of the door into the wall just inches from her face scared her so deeply that she jumped with a squeak and she shrunk from the masculine figure looming over her like an undertaker from Hell. The garish luminance of the outside light spilled over her white face from the gap between his arm and torso, revealing her to those sharp, inhuman eyes.

Lilith had never attempted to stab anyone before. But she knew – just as any prey-driven animal would – that if she didn't at least try to defend herself, bad things would happen. The desire to survive kicked her into action and impulsively she drew back her arm, weapon arcing to slash whatever part of his body she could reach.

He caught her deftly by the forearm, stilling her swing so suddenly that it jarred her shoulder. His other hand closed around the needle and wrenched it from her shivery grasp with as much difficulty as wresting a toy from an infant. The considering glance he shot it was edged with a patronizing amusement, as though he found it humorous that she had not only fought him, but with something so delicate.

"You don't even know how to use this thing," he mused with a quiet note of scorn.

Then he was pulling back his arm and letting the barb fly free, a burst of unreal strength to drive its course. Whistling through air, it split the empty vase on the little table between bureau and window into a mass of glittering shards before burying half of its length into the wall. Judging by the solid crack, it had punched into the sheetrock.

His snort of laughter fell upon ears that rang with the echoes shattered glass. "I doubt you could do so much damage with your entire body to power your throw."

She only faintly heard him. Her focus had followed her wide green eyes as they fixed to the shiny spike lodged deep in her bedroom wall, stricken by the painful notion that her skull would not have fared so well. And that very well could have _been_ her skull, had he chosen.

Winded by dreadful awe she was, it didn't stop her from struggling when his large hands curled around her forearms and began dragging her toward him.

She riled and twisted, trying to gouge her fingernails into his wrists to discourage him, and when that didn't work she lashed out with her knee, aiming for the groin. It was not a tactic she had used before, though she could remember at least one incident where it might have been useful, and couldn't quite believe she was actually depending on such a basic instinct to maim in order to free herself. But the demon was quick to block her strike with a well-placed leg, deflecting the blow with the muscled length of his thigh.

Firming his grip, he yanked her sideways to press her back into the door-jam, where her shoulder blades sparked with a tiny trace of pain. He was rough, unexpectedly so, but not enough to hurt her badly. The worst part of it was the tightened proximity she found to the sturdy structure of his torso. The wrongness of his chest so close her own drew a convulsive shudder.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," he warned dryly. But he seemed to be enjoying himself, watching her intently, as though he could see the cogs in her head turn and work, trying to dredge up some way to protect herself.

Instead, her head was filled with the confusion which tangled with her fear. What did this demon want with her? Why was he doing this? She risked a glance upward at her assailant's grin, fierce and sharp as a hungry tiger, and wondered whether he was going to kill her or eat her.

He began to pull her forward, out of the bathroom and through bedroom door into the hall. "We're going on a walk," he cooed, the amiable tone scraping her raw and numb at the nerves, bathing her in a chill that had little to do with the cold of the outside air which washed in through her door with its shattered lock. It struck her as soon as they neared the stairwell, as she was towed along by the stranger, streaking into her bones, and yet she could barely feel it for the fear coursing like adrenaline through her veins.

"Do as I say," he told her silkily, "and I promise nothing will do you any unnecessary harm."

* * *

The empty space at the back of his mind flickered out like a light, faint, quiet, and unnoticed under distraction.

He had been conversing with Marius, a minor judge and the gatekeeper of Purgatory, on the issue of the Iscariot Record duplicate project. The demon had poured over one of the original documents for the better part of three hours, utilizing the pair of spectacles that – much like Balberith's – had been spelled to reveal and penetrate concealment, misdirection and deception. But he had come up empty, as empty as if there had never been any spells placed on the records at all.

The frustration Azrael felt was shared by Marius, who was among the ranks of upper-class demons who tended to lean toward the side of Heaven when conflict threatened. Thus, without their hoped-for solution, the pair of them were brooding by the time Marius' mate happened upon them. Upon seeing the state of the menfolk's gray mood, Genevieve had sat them down and forced nearly an entire plate of her spice cookies into their stomachs whilst Marius attempted another method of searching for the source of the records' falsehood.

Genevieve had been human once; a women native to the northern reaches of what hadn't yet been the British Isles. Human war had drawn her to Marius, who had pursued her with a relentless amount of attention which she had scorned until the day he had saved her from a fatal arrow-wound which had damaged her spine. They had been inseparable ever since.

The reaching was almost instinctual by now, driven sometimes by emotion or a subconscious need to check. He had reached for the connection so often that he barely had to concentrate to do so.

But when his focus extended, seeking the warm ribbon of the link, he met nothing but empty space.

Azrael excelled at his craft, had been born with magic running rich through his blood. He could not recall a single instance where he had been unable to locate a human with whom he was familiar, no matter how great the distances stretched. Certainly not one to whom he was so tightly bound. He reached again, positive he had just misjudged due to distraction. For the second time, there was nothing.

Something was very, _very_ wrong.

He bolted, leaving his hosts to stare after him in alarm. Moving in a flare of speed that turned him to a feathered blur down the palace halls, he worked to keep the raging swell of worry and fear from blinding him to reason. The need for a crystal to confirm what he desperately hoped to be a lie was potent enough to cause his control to falter, making it difficult to process what exactly he would do if it was true.

The locks to his rooms gave way before he drew near enough to touch them, surrendering to the sheer weight of a turbulent spiritual energy. With a thunderous bang the bedchamber door slammed open and he crossed the floor of his safe-haven, powerful form stalking to the cherry-paneled cabinets which stood to either side of a framed 1820's map of Italy.

His hand reached left of the aged document, undoing the closures of the cabinet's topmost compartment and pulled it open. Out of a shallow ivory dish he lifted a crystal roughly the size of a lemon. Under the soft clear light from the lamps hung from the ceiling it glittered faint and pretty, but devoid of any consolation. He flooded it with power, enough that even the tough, ethereal substance threatened to crack. And there was nothing to show for it but the dull hum of spent chakra.

The crystal slipped from his fingers, striking the stone floor with the condemned foreboding of a gavel and rolling dejectedly away.

Normally he needed no tool in order to see; location was not a difficult spell. While occasionally a restless mind required a focus to direct energy, the fact that he could not feel her even with direct aide was additional evidence pointing to a conclusion he had dreaded. That somehow Lilith had been blocked from his sight.

Remembering that he had never set her with an actual tracking spell did nothing to ease his suddenly edgy temper. He had simply relied on natural instinct to find her before. A careless mistake.

In the darkest, grimmest part of his soul, he had feared something like this would happen. It had been a cancer of a threat, building on the bloodied pinpricks at her wrist, yet he hadn't given it the credit it had deserved.

How could he have predicted that his protective measures would be overridden? Who would have had the power and the will to pursue such an endeavor? He had broadcasted his warnings loud and clear, had felt the slight tremor in response, and thought he would have more time to hunt down the source of the subtle malice.

But now it was too late. She had vanished; spirited from his radar like a spectral memory, whisked away with a brutal efficiency by a phantom intent on reaching him through a volatile weakness.

Yet none of these things, fact or speculation, solved his problem. He may have his suspicions, but not even the entirety of what information he had was enough to stake a claim, let alone give him lawful right to a hunt. The laws were rigid and harsh, but they were law. Scent recognition, coincidence, the tang of familiar pattern; there was just no physical proof, nothing to give him a reason to seek the blood his vengeance craved. And with every moment of inaction, Lilith was in danger.

Damned if he did, damned if he didn't.

Lost in twisting, brooding thoughts, he wandered his way to the bed, shedding his formal vest and shirt as he did so, and flopped dejectedly across the mattress with an absent whisper. "Where are you…" Closing his eyes against the chaos of uncertainty, rage and awful distress, he let his head sink back into the pillows to think.

Obviously he couldn't just lay there in a fretful stupor; he had to act, not just for his duty as a guardian but as an individual. He had never been the type to falter and deliberate while someone suffered for his own miscalculations. Lilith was his ward – the most precious thing he had left in his miserable existence. He didn't know what he would do if she came to harm because of him, or the enemies he had made during his long life.

He would start at her apartment. There could be some sign of what had happened, and if not he could probably find a strand of her hair to serve as a rudimentary focus to track her. Crude as it was to use pieces or fluids from the body, short of a tracking spell inserted into the flesh (which he had not done), it was all he had. And he was desperate enough to forgo some Seraph propriety.

The muted click of the shutting door tore him from his muddled worries, reminding him, with a flicker of alarm, of his foolishness in neglecting to reset the locks to his suite. Such a mistake could result in the theft or damage of valuable documents – not terribly unlikely in a realm forged from hatred and spite for his kind.

Startled into movement, the muscles of his stomach and shoulders sharply contracting to sit bolt upright beneath the draped canopy of his bed. One elegant hand rose to the level of his eyes, poised and already glimmering with the call of magic…only to run tense fingers distractedly through his loose hair upon sight of the woman that stood before him.

"Nisroc, I didn't hear—I thought you were a…" He forced himself to a measure of calm which slid smoothly across his face like a shield and cleared his throat to finish smoothly; "good evening."

She was a woman of proud poise, tall and curvy, holding herself with an air of rather imperious nobility. Her hair was a thick honey blond which cascaded almost to her waist and her eyes, heavily highlighted with cosmetic, a riveting blue that might have been the depths of the ocean shaped into irises. And just as crushing, but shallow.

From a single glance, one could clearly see she was well aware of her beauty. Her dress was a vivid shade of red to match her painted lips and had been meant to draw the eyes, for the material hugged her generous hips and chest as though it were a second skin. Slit to the thigh and cutting low across the neckline, it didn't even attempt the guise of innocence. She was lovely, yes, but cheaply so.

A smile lifted the corners of her full red mouth. It was a charming, well-practiced smile, trained to jerk the chain of any witness and perfectly matching the low, breathy tone she used to reply; "And to you."

Gifted with the easy grace of immortality she seemed to glide forward, shapely hips swaying perhaps more than was completely necessary; approaching him on light feet with her arms crossed just beneath her chest. She observed him with a coquettish mixture of amusement and interest. "All alone?" she asked him coyly, soft with a thread of light curiosity. "What's a man like you doing alone on a night as fine as this, Azrael?"

A single pale eyebrow rose, the only hint toward the sudden, edgy unease that pressed at the base of his consciousness. Azrael stood with a single, sleek motion and leaned guardedly back against the empty space of wall beside the ornate bedpost. Doing so put him a good half a foot higher in stature than she, a small comfort, but much better than appearing subtly submissive.

"Searching," he murmured, watching her with a careful eye, keenly aware of what she was trying to do.

Unfortunately for Nisroc, the mistress of Hell's kitchens and organizer of all formal functions, her reputation preceded her. She was the precise definition of a succubus. Despite the seemingly tame nature of her duties, every thought, every breath she took was devotedly woven into her insatiable desire for a new man in her bed.

An expert in the arts of seduction and provocation, Nisroc thrived on the knowledge that she would be adding another name to her list of willing victims. She hungered incessantly, an addict of a pitiable sort. Succumbing to her bastard of a brother's choice to drag her to ruin with him to ruin had exiled her from Heaven's graces, but it was her own empty lust, her thousand emotionless trysts, which kept her there in heart, if not in soul.

Her attentions had long been on him, as he knew far better than many might have suspected. Exactly how long she had been biding her time, waiting for a moment of weakness to make another thinly-veiled offer, he did not know. Yet regardless of impressions she may have made about him – starved and vulnerable with longing, as the rumors whispered – she did not know him as well as she thought she did.

As he had politely informed her, more than once, Azrael was not interested. Flattering as it was to be found so attractive, he found nothing under her skin to be worth the heartache she would bring him.

It might have been amusing had the situation not been so serious. Nisroc was not known for taking rejection well, using manipulation or force when she had to. She was also nobility.

Even in times of peace Hell's hierarchy was just strict enough that the hint of injustice could upset the caustic balance of his presence there. And lord only knew how she would react when he declined to take the bait she so lavishly and uselessly offered to him. Despite his black mood, despite how little he needed the distraction, it would be unwise to act rashly.

So, gritting his teeth against the urge to toss her from his rooms to leave him to his admittedly still unformed plans, he tuned his concentration to civility and counseled himself to patience.

"What for?" she had inquired, and it was impossible to miss the raking sweep of her gaze from behind eyelashes curled thick with mascara, down along the lithe structure of his arms, shoulders and torso.

"For the inspiration to do something."

His carefully neutral answer appeared to amuse her, for Nisroc's ripe, rouged lips twisted into a smirk, flirty and sweet. She lifted a casual hand and lightly touched the smooth arc of his collarbone, instigating a trailing caress of fingers that slipped softly down across the left side of his chest, directly over his heart. Her long scarlet nails etched blatantly suggestive patterns across his bare skin.

Either she didn't notice the subtle flare of displeasure sparking in his eyes or had chosen to ignore it. Whatever the case, his control was definitely something to be admired considering the pains he took not to lash her into place.

"Is that so?" she simpered, an entreating, velvety purr coiled within her voice. Her fingertips danced lower still, following the toned contours of his stomach and feigning ignorance to his warning glare. "Here, let me help."

Quick as a snake, her hand slid down his abdomen to slip between his thighs, hard and demanding. A choked gasp of shock that burst from his throat, and she bathed in her moment of power, relishing the stiff tightening of his powerful figure as she pressed her body against him, skillfully angling so that the tenderest pressure points were met. She lifted her face to murmur against his ear, "does that _inspire _you?" and a slim pink tongue darted from between her lips to taste the lobe.

Throwing off his surprise, Azrael shoved her away; pale eyes ringed with disgust, misplacing politeness under the flash of scorn as he snapped, "_Don't _touch me."

She laughed, smoothing her hands over the front of her dress. "Oh please, Azrael." The scarlet fabric pulled taut across the taper of her waist and breasts, the shimmer of it undeniably pleasing to the eye, but the effect left him cold and unresponsive. "You'll give in. Everyone does in the end."

Sinking gracefully onto the edge of his bed, she lounged as though she owned the room and everything in it. Lower lip teased between her teeth, she twined a thick strand of honey hair around one finger and looked up at him from beneath the veil of her lashes. A seductive ploy, but one that went ignored.

"Don't flatter yourself," the angel retorted, tone dry and cool with dislike. His skin crawled, wanting to cleanse away the invisible grime left by Nisroc's covetous fingers. He hadn't been touched like that by a woman since Rebecca, and now he remembered why. There was no touch he wanted but Lilith's. "I have no desire to be involved with you. My affections belong to another and there they shall remain."

"What, that girl I've heard Mastema mention to Pandora?" She scoffed, her tinkling laughter impossibly derisive. "No _human _can match me."

Azrael's face was an icy mask cold as crystal, as firm and unyieldingly smooth as his voice. "For others, perhaps."

Her lips curved, sinful and scalding to smile prettily up at him. She propped herself up by supporting her weight on her palms and the new position accented the full, hourglass curve of her figure, deliberately taunting him – or, trying to. An open-armed invitation she extended, using her natural advantages in attempts to wear down his time-wearied resistances.

"You don't know what I can give you," her voice was honey-coated sweetness, goading and pleading, dipping into her stores of skill intended to twist his heart and will to her favor. "Anything and everything you could ever want and more!"

Toes shod in deadly five-inch heels found his ankle and, ever so deftly, slid up the length of his leg, shameless in the artful stroke of a muscular thigh encased in sleek black fabric.

It made him nauseous to listen, grated at his nerves to endure her touch. Nothing about her proposal tempted him, despite the whispered coos illustrating the spiritual fulfillment he so fervently longed for. The promises were nothing but a lie. She offered him a mere physical pleasure, empty, barren, comfortless. She offered him lust when he needed love, as a man dying of thirst needed water, as a drowning man needed air.

Even if he couldn't have Lilith, he certainly wasn't going to start crawling to this whore's jeweled hem for purging. The very idea repulsed him, offended him, clawed at his sense of moral honor. No; there was no decision to be made.

Unable to contain his revulsion any longer, Azrael pulled away from her explorative touch, stern resolve to grace his beautiful features. But beneath the façade, he felt drained and worn. Worry did terrible things to one's health, straining and twisting at the nerves until they frayed at the seams, only adding to the heavy burden of having been lonely for so long, the sacrilege to his very nature.

It was because of that burden that this succubus believed she had some sway over him.

He turned on her, torn between frustrated anger and a forlorn sense of despair. He wanted to be rid of her incessant propositions, wanted her gone, so he could focus on his duty.

"You can give me nothing that I want. Nothing you have is worth the sin I would commit to take it. Lust is a desolate thing without love, and for you I have neither." Every word of it was truth. He would wait for his ward unto the ends of the earth, a pledge worth more than his own blood. She was fond of him, bonded to him. That was enough, even if she could never come to love him.

For a moment his strong shoulders sagged under a sudden, crushing wave of anguish, and he was forced to lean heavily against the wall to let it pass.

"I apologize, but I must decline. Whatever sin I have belongs to Lilith."

Nisroc's blue eyes widened, taken aback by the severity of his resolve, the remarkably civilized refusal. It brought her pause, wondering how to respond to the dignity he had crammed into the argument, how to squeeze between the chinks in his armor, how to take that cool, refined angelic prowess in her capable hands and twist him raw and wanting.

All of a sudden he was turning his back to her, so cold and final that her pupils narrowed, forming angry slits. He actually believed the nonsense he spoke; that he would gladly waste himself to celibacy for some human nobody.

The pleasant, if provocative, air she had worn vanished to be replaced by the faintest sneer of distaste. "You let their humanity bewitch you, hmm? Mortals and immortals aren't meant to intermingle," she murmured silkily, "let alone—"

"I made my decision," Azrael interrupted, his voice rising just slightly to locate a tone that allowed for no argument. He did not address her hypocrisy, didn't question it; merely focused on making his point. "Twenty years ago I made my choice and I will stand by that choice until either the Almighty demotes me for it, or I come to the end of existence."

He straightened abruptly, shaking the hair back from his face so the pale mane fell to brush his throat, nape streaked with the silver-toned white of feathers. "And I have nothing more to say to you."

"She's too different—_you_ are too different!" The she-demon insisted, annoyance with his stubbornness heating her cold eyes. Can't you see? She's _incapable_ of fully understanding you or what you offer her. She'll leave you with nothing, broken and alone."

He said not a word. While he did nothing so rude as to throw her out, the refusal to acknowledge her transformed annoyance into anger.

She rose fluidly to her feet, maneuvering with quick, harsh steps around him to stare into his violet eyes, standing close enough to touch. Rage overtook her; fury with the pious angel and his sentimental folly to tie himself so resiliently to the chit he claimed to need so deeply. It was a waste, sheer waste of talent and s perfect face, a waste of an angel's power and passion for him to pine over a timid little shrew who couldn't appreciate what she had.

It was downright _shameful._

"You're a fool," she hissed, snakelike and venomous, gripping his shoulders with her varnished nails, "to think a pitiful mortal brat like her could love you."

His eyes flashed dark with warning, a sudden shift under the pensive surface of his ice-hard mask. But in her fury she did not see it. Instead her focus shifted, weaving flattery and supplication into her words in the faint hope that he might yet concede and let her have her prize. "You are strong and beautiful, Azrael! You deserve someone capable of giving you everything you desire…capable of loving you for what you _are—_"

"Silence."

The word fell from his lips with a harsh snap of rare anger, his eyes a purple so dark that it was almost black, flushed with the spark of a rich, dangerous burgundy. He tore through her grip, forcing her away while energy crackled and sang upon his skin and in his blood. While his face was steely calm, his voice and eyes blazed burning with ice, clearly revealing that he had seen through her half-formed persuasion spell.

"Keep your tongue behind your teeth, snake," he growled, voice husky with a terrible tremor. "Your poisoned charms won't work on me. How dare you try my fealty—"

"But I—"

"I said _enough!_"

His voice crackled with ice that seized her voice and cut it to silence, the pure commanding force of the order causing her eyes to flicker with alarm.

Azrael was renowned for his eerily civil manner and light step about prudence and law, his skill with debate. But he was never less than collected, dignified, holding himself with a calm, cool-headed propriety, sometimes sharp, but hardly ever angry. He was not a man to lose his temper lightly, if at all. And as she peered up at him, seeing his pitiless eyes gleaming with tightly-reined fury, she realized that she had made a very grave mistake.

When first approached with the proposition she had faltered when faced with the prospect of Heavenly wrath, but her hungry dreams of stripping the barriers from the angel's firm white flesh had numbed her better sense.

It had been foolhardy to bait him. Now he was alert and focused, and she had no way of knowing whether she had kept him distracted long enough.

She never should have made that bargain.

His eyes were narrowing, piercing into her as though he had caught a flash of something across her face, something he was working to read. That was when she remembered his ability to tap into emotion, interpret it and decode it. Quickly tried to wipe herself clean of all expression; trying to mask her eyes of everything she thought and felt, to shield her fear of her partner's retribution, her deception, her knowledge from him. But it was too late.

She choked when his powerful hand closed around her neck. Her shoulders struck stone as he slammed her back into the wall, lifting her so that her toes just barely brushed the floor and forcing her to meet the eyes roiling with dark, terrible rage.

He knew. He had caught the flicker of connection to the man who had been stalking his ward for the past two weeks; her partner, who had come to her with a plot that had seemed so wonderful at the time. Now it seemed like a death sentence.

"Where is she?" he hissed, wolfish and menacing in a way that befitted the wrath of God.

She stared, dazed by the crushing pressure of his Thrall, a compulsion the likes of which she had never faced before. It was only due to a great deal of fear that it neglected to snare her upon impact. For her own protection she feigned innocence, widening her blue eyes and croaking pitifully, "Azrael…what—?"

The grip around her throat tightened, harder than iron and squeezing tightly enough to crush his fingertips into the sensitive windpipe. Her hands rose on instinct to push weakly at his wrist, as if it would make him let go. But immortal or no, she could not match the angel's strength, and he would not to release her.

Azrael's marble lips pulled back in a livid snarl. "Do not mistake me for one of your heartsick pleasure toys, Nisroc. I have no qualms over breaking your neck if you don't start talking."

He was serious. He would tear through her like tissue paper, and whatever damage he did would linger upon her soul form. There would be no escape now. Nothing she said would convince him of her ignorance, no plea would save her; no honeyed whisper would coax him back to cracking for her syrup of lies. She was doomed regardless; to his vengeance or her cohort's, it made little difference.

She wet her lips to battle the dry leech of fear and whisper, "I don't know."

"Come again?" The accent woven within his voice was dangerously smooth, and she could feel his fingers prepare to readjust against her skin to form a death grip.

"I don't know where she is!" she cried, the admission bursting from her mouth, fueled by fear.

He snorted. "How could you _possibly—_"

"Malik has her, all right? I don't know where he took her!"

Azrael's fair face paled drastically, his eyes flashing with lilac so pale that it nearly blended with the whites of his eyes. Startled confusion preceded a dreading comprehension. He had expected another name, which was clear in the vehemence between the warring emotions. "Malik…?"

The fan of his breath was hot and sweet across her face, firm mouth close enough to kiss. But she wouldn't have dared to try for the inconsolable fear that he might rip her soul out from between her lips. Eternity seemed to pass while she gazed into those fathomless eyes, but it was no more than mere seconds before the pallor of his irises dissolved into black.

Not plum violet, not burgundy, but _black; _as pure and depthless as the fabric of night.

He threw her to the floor, the bone-cracking, throat-crushing grip abandoned as though he couldn't stand to touch her any longer. Wrath enfolded his figure like a pair of black shadowed wings, infused with a searing fury, all gentle manner devoured by livid, scarlet rage. "You gave her to _Malik?_ What possessed you?" the question rolled from the depths of his chest, shuddering with a bestial growl. "He is an _Overseer_—nothing but filth and _cruelty!_"

Clutching her aching throat, she flinched beneath the temper he no longer attempted to contain, curling defensively against the wall. "That was our bargain," she responded, half-drawn by the wrenching pull of his magic to force it out regardless of her reluctance. "He got the blood to split the wards on her home, and when we had the opportunity to get the both of you alone I was supposed to distract you. I don't know what else he planned. It's not like I had a choice…"

She gazed up at him, careful makeup smudged and fine dress rumpled, blue eyes beseeching; _I only did what was best for you._

His face was coldly smooth, faultless, the epitome of ivory perfection, and yet it drove a shiver of fright up her spine to chill her bones when he told her in a soft, venomous whisper, "if I find that a _trace _of harm has befallen her—a bruise, a single mark on her skin—and I will personally make sure that you never draw another breath without feeling a blade between your ribs."

She gaped. "You wouldn't. It's not in your nature to cause harm—" The disbelieving protest faded as she felt the throbbing imprints of his fingers beneath her touch, ringing her throat like a banded necklace she could not see, but knew was there.

"You know nothing of my nature," he said quietly.

With a swift whisk of pale hair and dark slacks he was gone. He left her there, on the floor of his bedchamber without another glance or word, the promise of retribution tangible in his wake.

Long minutes after he had gone, Nisroc remained, staring after him, her eyes still wide and white-rimmed with awe and her hands still clutching her damaged throat. She had never seen such a display of temper from the soft-spoken seraph before. He had been suffering for so long, rubbing elbows with madness, and she had thought he might let himself drown rather than see reason no matter how hard she pressed or sweetly she cajoled.

Yet he had not truly snapped until he had realized her link to the threat to his precious charge.

Could the girl's devotion to the angel be as true and deep as Azrael's was to her? If so, the Overseer would be hard-pressed to challenge such a powerful, intimate bond, and after what she had just witnessed, Azrael would surely rip Malik apart for daring to touch his chosen woman.

A wave of vivid green envy bled through her veins. The mortal bitch had put some kind of a spell over the angel, but he would learn. Once the wretched human girl turned her back on him, as Nisroc knew she would, he would be on his knees to beg for the gift he had so crassly ignored tonight. He would learn she had been right all along, once his little pet cowered and bit at the hand extended to her.

She got gingerly to her feet, smoothing out her dress to soothe the wounds to her pride. Wanting to be far away by the time anyone happened along to stick their noses in the curious business of the angel's door, open wide to the dwelling halls, she slipped away.

The little human brat would not last long; of that much Nisroc was certain.


	30. The Angry and the Desperate

**Chapter 29  
**The Angry and the Desperate

Recommended Listening: "Beauty of the Beast" by Nightwish  
and "Broken" by Seether with Amy Lee

* * *

"Catch your breath."

Lilith was tossed to the ground with all the care of a sack of potatoes, and the ache of the impact with unyielding paving stones joined those from the brisk, hurried walk in shoes not meant for such exertion. She gasped against the jolt of pain, eyeing her captor with wary indignation. They had come only a little ways south, yet the pace set had been grueling.

The edge of Occidental Park was hemmed with trees, bare and leafless now that winter was so close, harsh, skeletal limbs gleaming by the light from the rows of old-fashioned street-lamps. She liked to come here to read and people watch on nice, sunny days off, to appreciate the meld of nature and man-made structure. Strangely, the place was empty. Streets of Seattle proper were rarely empty, not the nice, up kept ones like this. Perhaps there was some magic that could war people away from an entire area, though the purpose of such a spell eluded her.

The demon stood over her, brawny, leather-clad arms crossed over his chest and watching the street with what was an unmistakable nonchalance. Resentment curled inside her like a living thing. How could he stand there so calm and collected while she ached and strained for breath after struggling so hard down a few streets?

But that was hardly the most important thing.

What was going on? Why were they here, of all places? Was it just somewhere to go, somewhere on the way to another place? _What_ did he want with her? None of it mattered. All that mattered was that she should not be there, that she had to get away, by whatever means necessary. No more damsel in distress for Lilith Gandion!

Her flat-soled shoes scrabbled for balance against the chilled sidewalk, lurching slowly to her feet to conceal her intent behind a feigned spell of weakness. Then, when his face had angled slightly away from her, she lunged for the nearest path out of the park.

A startled cry forced its way from her throat when he caught her firmly by the arms and shoved her back against the brick wall of the art gallery, beneath the creeping descent of particularly tenacious ivy. It wasn't a patient gesture, and she hit the wall hard before sliding to the ground when her knees gave out. It frightened her, that source of merciless strength that didn't seem to acknowledge the limits of a fragile human body, merely tossed her about, brutally indifferent to her pain.

He advanced on her, a knowing, feral little smile curving his lips, and she shrunk back from him instinctively to huddle against the wall. "I suppose you think you're clever," he mused.

Somehow, she managed to muster a glare, chin lifting with all the defiance she possessed in spite of the way her insides quaked. "Don't patronize me. Even trying something I don't think will work is better than waiting around for you to do whatever it is you have planned. Why are you doing this, anyway?"

His laughter was loud, a hoarse, malicious sound that reminded her of fingernails scraping down a chalkboard and sent an abhorrent shudder down her spine. "Christ! You're far braver than I imagined. Would've thought you'd have your man do all your fighting for you," he spat derisively onto the sidewalk. "Not that it's saying much," he considered, "fucking weak—"

"He is worth _ten_ of you!"

The words flew from her mouth, shocking her with a vehemence that had been unexpected. There was no questioning how she had known he referred to Azrael, and yet the urge to defend her guardian had come swiftly and strongly, unwilling to sit by and let such slander go undisputed.

But her flash of bravery was short-lived, replaced instantly by fear when the demon crouched down beside her, formidable male body so close that she could almost feel the cold radiate from his skin. Her back pressed into the brick, ignoring the rough texture of stone and the smear of dirt and city grime that streaked the back of her white blouse. The dirt seemed positively friendly in comparison.

He was clearly amused by her outburst. His blazing eyes glittered with silent laughter as he leaned toward her, resting the flat of one forearm against the wall to one side of her head.

"Let me tell you something about your precious warden, sweetheart." He spoke with a hush, voice pitched low, as though he sharing some terrible secret with her. "I know things about the Angel of Death that would freeze your poor, tender little heart." His expression hardened with a sudden severity. "Did you think he was as perfect as he looked? Sorry to say he isn't. He's done me a _great_ discourtesy, and not one easily forgiven."

He regarded her attempts to push her way through the wall, unsuccessfully working to widen the space between them. She struggled like a delicate thing, trembling with cold and alarm. The fear was sugared and sweet on the air, light and delicious, a snare to the senses of his kind.

Something like casual approval smoothed the planes of his harshly angled face as his eyes flickered downward to examine her from crown to toes. He tucked a long finger beneath her chin, absently tilting her head to study her profile. "I have to admit, though," he remarked, "Azrael has damn good taste."

For some reason, the comment triggered a flash of temper. Pulling sharply out of his grasp, she drew back a hand and slapped him as hard across the face as she could. Her palm struck his cheekbone and sent his head jerking to one side, and while it did little damage to his strong immortal flesh, the violent noise of it had been quite satisfying.

"Stay away from me!" she snapped, pulling her knees up to her chest and circling them with her arms. It gave her the feeling of smallness and shelter, which was comforting even if it was imaginary.

Seconds later, a pained whimper escaped her lips when an iron hand closed rigidly about her upper arm to yank her from the ground. A snarl that darkened his face, his fingers digging painfully into her easily-bruised flesh as he towed her forward, step after step, dragging her despite how hard she pressed her heels into the pavement.

"You're very lucky I have a reason to keep from killing you," he growled, forcefully, as though he were holding back his temper with a great expansion of effort.

Tearing helplessly at the vice of his grip, Lilith's eyes flashed frantically back and forth between the bare trees, hoping beyond hope that someone would come and stop the monster who seemed hungry for her pain. She knew it was pointless. She could have torn her arm from the socket and he still wouldn't have released her. Yet it didn't stop her from screaming with every bit of strength she had, strength from deep down inside where he couldn't hurt her in payment for the noise.

Then, all of a sudden, as if her frenzied prayers had been answered, she could feel the space around them shift ever so slightly. At the corner of her eye, she caught just a glimpse of pale gold, a tiny glint of color, but it was enough to send her heart leaping into her throat with a dizzied, wilting relief.

He had heard, and he had come for her.

He looked strangely disheveled. His hair was wild in disarray, tousled by haste; his fine black slacks were rumpled above his boots. Yet there was something primitive and ancient about the way he stood there, shirtless, amidst the edgy rawness dancing upon the chilly air, radiating a stark, unshakable calm.

He took a single glance around the street to gather his bearings, a reflex likened to transportation without a preconceived destination, before the angel's pale lavender eyes met hes with a clash of color and awful fear.

Her heart skipped a beat, and then another, a flare of understanding warping the world around her with a convulsive spasm. The relief she had felt melted into horror as the pieces slid smoothly together in her mind. The demon had never wanted _her_, but the connection she had to Azrael; so he could use her as bait, to get close to the angel. To hurt him.

"No! Don't—" she cried, intent on protecting him by shouting a warning, but her voice died in her mouth. Her captor had traced an icy fingertip down her throat; stilling her power for sound with the sheer force of his will worked within a spell for silence and numbed nerves.

Taking advantage of her shock, the demon hooked a brawny arm around her waist, pulling her backward to press her flat to his chest, empty hand curling around her neck.

Lilith froze, recognizing the position as a dangerous one. She would gain nothing by struggling, lest she accidentally snap her own spine, but letting her arms hang limp at her sides made her feel ashamed that she could be so weak. That she was a tool for this creature to hurt someone she trusted was enough to make her sick to her stomach.

What emotion there had been in Azrael's eyes was there for only the briefest of moments before it slid behind an expression that was coldly blank. "What is the meaning of this, Malik?" he demanded, and there was a formality to the way he phrased the question, a cadence of impatience. He regarded them as though his only care was for the offense of the mistreatment of his charge, his Heavenly mandate as a guardian, not for someone he loved.

"Don't bother with that mask of yours," the demon at retorted, his voice sliding with a note of sadistic amusement. "I know what she is to you. I felt it in all the tender wards you put on her home. So considerate of you not to cage her away, though that probably would have been smarter…"

Azrael's expression did not change, but his right hand flexed an infinitesimal amount as he took a cautious step forward.

"Ah, ah!" The fingers of Malik's hands dug into her neck, carving small crescent-shaped grooves in her skin as he pulled her half a step backward. "No magic, angel, or I'll gut her like a fish. And you can stay right there, if you please."

Immediately the angel went still. He was forced to obey, his hands tied by the power Malik held over him, powerless to do anything but wait. Yet while the outward show of detachment remained firmly in place, the focus in Azrael's eyes never wavered.

She felt Malik's smile in the way the tension in the muscle at her back eased. "She's a pretty thing, isn't she?" his voice was rank with a lazed taunt. The sarcastic politeness raked against the nerves, a teeth-gritting wrongness as rancid as rotting meat. "What a dainty little girl. Such lovely hair..."

The demon's hand slid from her locked throat to comb sly fingers through the strands of dark hair that had come loose from its unraveling knot. She wanted to retch. Bile bubbled hot and foul at the back of her throat, her stomach twisting with disgust.

"Such soft skin…" An icy stroke to her cheek shot a horrid shudder streaking along her spine. But she couldn't move, not even to dislodge the knuckles at her chin, not with his will still locking her in place. "Such sweet lips..." She stiffened when his cheek brushed her own, feeling his breath, a frigid lash, against her face.

Then, swift and violent, he lifted her chin and pressed his mouth to hers, forcing her lips to part with a vicious, delving tongue to swipe at her. It couldn't even be called a kiss. It was callous and crude; a rape of any decent touch.

Lilith jerked away, spluttering and gasping, scandalized, for a clean breath, motion returned to her with thanks to a horror-struck compilation of shock and revulsion. She hurt, her lips burned with the rise of bruises and her teeth ached as though she could feel the rot of the demon's touch destroying her from the inside outward. All the while his laughter rang raucous and malicious in her ears.

Furious, shameful tears blurred her vision. She felt like a helpless child; ruined, _defiled,_ and Azrael had seen. How would she ever endure it? She wanted to cry, wanted to scream and writhe and fight her way free, snapped neck or no, because even that had to be better than suffering this monster's savagery.

"And look, she's got some spirit in her! How intriguing…"

Chilled fingers trailed down the side of her neck and along her sternum, easily slipping two of her buttons free to expose her skin, the very tips of index and middle fingers venturing down between her breasts until they brushed the edge of her bra.

Lilith choked on her own inhale; her muscles coiling against the urgent desire to buck like a horse would an unwanted rider. She did _not_want him touching her. It was a ruse, a trick, a ploy to spark temper and weaken the opposition by waking volatile emotions.

"Take your hands off her!"

Azrael's voice was deadly when he spoke, the words flying from his lips sharp and accurate as a dagger, fused with the subtle ripple of an animal growl. The ruse of platonic dispassion had been forgone in the face of his anger. Violet eyes blazed with a mixture of outrage and worry, but he seemed to recognize the uneven balance of power, for he took a moment to reconstruct a shaky shield of calm, and rephrased, "Your quarrel is with me. Leave her out of this."

Malik merely shrugged, empty hand closing around the captive girl's wrist to form a loose, confidant shackle. "Hmm—I like her just fine where she is." He flashed a sharp grin toward the angel's direction, a deliberate hint that he rather enjoyed such a close proximity with soft, female flesh. "I knew Nisroc wouldn't keep you busy for long. If you ask me, I got the better end of our bargain."

"I _didn't_ ask you," Azrael snapped harshly, the prim, gentle melody of his speech swallowed by the fluid rise of temper. He crossed his arms over his bare chest, defiant and fierce. Quite inappropriately, Lilith could feel her breath hitch high and hard in the back of her throat upon sight of the pale gold light creating a halo of his cream-pale skin. All white silk and lightning shaped over graceful, flexible steel.

She would never get used to him. Even now, with danger being shoved down her throat like cough syrup, her own life threatened and, she still found the audacity to be dazzled.

Had it been _Azrael_to kiss her with such fervor, she was positive she would not have pulled away. It would have been different, knowing that any roughness was composed of passion instead of malice, drawn from ardor and not from a grudge.

"Still, I should have counted on you getting here so quickly—she didn't even keep you occupied for five minutes!" Malik continued, ignoring the interruption. There was a twisted humor behind his chatty commentary; as though chastising himself for a tactical error with the same breath he used to jeer. "So eager to protect your property. But then again, why waste time with a whore when you can break a virgin, am I right?"

Azrael's jaw tightened, revulsion turning his handsome features stony and cold. "That's your opinion, and a mark of the difference between us."

The scorching dryness of his tone left no question as to the honesty within the statement. Had she had been the whore and this Nisroc the virgin, had their personalities been the same and physical status the only contest toward which he would choose, his decision would have been the same. It was touching to hear him say it, and made her stupid heart want to melt into a puddle of nonsensical goo.

But it was an opportunity she couldn't afford to miss. The exchange of dialogue was a gift, drawing the demon's attention away from his captive, and she molded her focus to a very slow study of any possible weaknesses his grip might have.

Azrael's gaze flickered in the briefest of glances her way, but he looked away so quickly that it was impossible to tell whether he was taking care to avoid bringing the other male's attention down on her or whether it had simply been an anxious reflex. "I will ask you once more—"

"Ask anything you like, Azrael," Malik taunted, lifting his hand from Lilith's shirt-front to shake a finger at the angel's insulted stare, "but that doesn't mean you'll receive."

Pale violet eyes flashed darker than the blackest of earthly nights with shining, awful, wine-colored anger.

As if in tune to the fluctuation of Azrael's mood, the violent rage imprinted there, the sky seemed to mirror it. Thunder rolled from the vast pockets of air set high within the atmosphere in a low, rumbling snarl, lightning split the night, bleeding out the stars for its brightness. It leaked through the light cloud cover, harsh and bright, tainted with lavender to shade the blue-velvet pitch.

She could see the muscles in his right arm ripple, just slightly, with a faint, thin sheen of violet flame and the glitter of tiny white sparks, before he managed to smother the reflexive lash of energy. All that power forced back because he knew releasing it in the form of a weapon could mean her death. With a flash of pallor, the color turning his gentle eyes dark with ferocity faded to a weary orchid painted fine with distress.

"Why waste your time with unnecessary actions?" he asked, "If you wanted a pound of my flesh all you had to do was confront me—"

The scarlet-haired demon threw his head back and laughed. It was vivid and blinding, hot and acrid like sulfur, pouring from his throat, interrupting the angel's words and causing Lilith to flinch and wonder how a living creature could make such an awful sound. The noise of it had pained her fragile human eardrums, shaking her down to the bones.

Suddenly she realized that the merciless grip around her waist had begun to loosen, and her heart gave a tiny skip of frenzied excitement. If his arm grew slack by just a fraction more, she could break free. She went perfectly still, all but for the pound of her heartbeat, hardly daring to breathe for fear that he would discover her plot to flee, and fixed her wide eyes to Azrael, his lovely face, her direction and her goal.

She had to escape this monster's grip, had to get away from this vile creature of filth and sin. She had to flee for the shelter she knew she would find tucked beneath the angel's powerful arm and cradled to his chest.

Azrael stood in silence, his posture casual and apathetic; a loose stance intended to show venerability and a lack of weapon. It was a way of giving Malik the position of power, even if only to the demon's own perception, because there was nothing but tension of snow-white shoulders to hint that Azrael was anything but perfectly, chillingly calm. A weary gray tinged the outermost rum of his irises, betraying the fear he could not show.

It was now or never.

When she moved, it was with a staggering lunge forward, frantically launching herself from the sturdy, unforgiving arms and evil eyes.

For a moment, the sensation of escape created a maddened giddiness inside her stomach, fluttering like joyful butterflies. Yet not a split second passed before the iron force hit her square in the back, ripping a pained cry from her lungs as Malik snatched her by the wrist and jerked her backward, arm tightening mercilessly around her middle.

Flush against the demon's muscled body, she blinked back startled tears, throat aching with the force with which her shout had torn itself through her.

The demon's empty hand rose to wrap securely around her throat, his grip hard and pitiless. "Care to try that again, honey," he hissed, fingers clenching so tight that she almost choked, and surely would have had he not released her after a breath, "and I'll throttle you where you stand."

She swallowed thickly, limp and wilting as a rag-doll beneath the weight of her prison. Dazed as she was, however, she still managed to glimpse Azrael's powerful hands clenching into tight, white-knuckled fists.

"Malik," his musical voice was strained, his eyes marbled dark with a twist of fury and fear, "just let her _go._"

Malik cut him off with a snarl, all cruel amusement gone. In its place was a vicious edge that turned his voice to unyielding brimstone. "When I finally have a way to bring you down?" He snorted, condescending with disbelief, as if he couldn't really comprehend what he had heard.

Adjusting his grip around Lilith's neck, he pressed her even tighter to his brawny torso, either ignoring or taking pleasure in her loathing shudder. He was just careful enough to avoid breaking her neatly in two as his biting malice cut into the cold. "You _destroyed _my career!"

"I—" Azrael's comprehension melded with a streak of incredulity. "I found a flaw. A _flaw,_ that's _all._I presented my report to the council as I was asked, but I had nothing to do with Lucifer demoting you to Tartarus like a common—"

"_Shut your fucking mouth!"_

The bestial snarl came with an awful burst of fury, Malik's iron-strong fingers crushing harshly into Lilith's tender, unprotected throat. And Azrael obeyed instantly, pressing his lips together to silence his protest, gaze fixed to his precious ward's face for any sign that she was in pain.

After a moment Malik's lethal rage slid into another nasty smile, sickly sweet with a false concern for the woman held against him, as though he had the capacity for honest affection. "We wouldn't want the little beauty's neck to break, now would we?"

Azrael's expressive face darkened dangerously; the aura of subdued strength around him swelling with a deep pulse of power. Normally he was able to pass as human, but not now. There was something completely devoid of that human compassion or benevolence rising from inside him, something purer and deeper. When the full weight of that gaze slid from her to the man who had abused her in front of him, she wondered whether part of her soul had been seared from her body.

"You bastard," he whispered, and the muted words tangled with a wolfish growl, language warped by anger. "You filthy, wretched _bastard,_ how _dare _you use her to get to me…"

Green eyes wide with a tiny surge of alarm, almost to the point of horror, Lilith stared at her guardian, bewildered by the violent force of his words. This was not the man she knew. The light in those once so caring, generous eyes was more devil than angel at the moment, leeched of the kindness and geniality, the loving being she recognized. What had turned him into this harsh, savage mirror of himself?

She watched him tense, heard the sighing rustle of feathers when his beautiful white wings burst from his shoulders to arc brilliant and silvery white in the golden street light, and yet she felt no comfort.

The set of his face was too close to the photograph she could still see at the fringe of her memory, stark and empty, the shell of a good man gone to ruin. A man bled by the world for shortcomings unbeknownst to him; for his desperate need to feel. That same haunted void was in his eyes, vague, flickering back and forth between an explosive fury just waiting to be unleashed. And it was wrong.

It made her want to cry.

She swallowed a yelp when the demon's fingers tangled in a good-sized chunk of her hair with which he wrenched her head back. Stray hairs tore from her scalp and she choked back the tears of pain stinging her eyes. He had nestled the back of her head against his collar, the buckle of leather firm against her skull, to stare deep into her face with eyes of blaring, bloody orange. His eyes had slit pupils. Like a cat, or, perhaps more fiendishly accurate, a snake; the symbol of absolute evil as depicted in the story of Eve's sin and Adam's betrayal.

Malik held up his other hand, no longer needing it to keep her confined, and her wide eyes fixed to the sturdy, powerful fingers caught in the yellowed halo of light from above. Before her very eyes his nails slid outward from his fingertips, elongating beyond six inches to form thin, stiletto-sharp claws. The edges were stained an awful rusty red, streaked with the aged blood of who knew how many victims.

He smiled at her, and it was a bitter smile, leering, accented by a silken whisper of, "say goodbye to life, my lovely."

For a moment her mind swam with confusion, wondering what he could have meant. Then his grip adjusted, gripping cruelly at her neck to dig hard fingertips painfully deep into the soft line of her jugular, as though he might simply rip her throat out. That was when she realized exactly what she was. She was not merely bait dangled to draw the angel here to be hurt, but a source of a deeper torture altogether. Her _death_ would be the cause of that pain Malik so desired to inflict, the punishment for past wrongs.

She could no longer see Azrael, but she felt his familiar presence throb with desperation and cold, empty ire. The amount of the worth these immortal men associated with a plain human girl like her was both amazing and terrifying.

While it was unclear what exactly she should expect, she could guess that it would cause her a great deal of pain, for the more suffering she did, the more torturous it would be for her guardian to watch. Yet she found the prospect of injury and death was not what made her shiver and cower and strain at her arched spine. It was the notion that she would be missed, more desperately than she had the capacity to comprehend.

The very tips of Malik's claws brushed the curves of her breasts with tiny, hair-line caresses to yet unscathed pale skin, reveling in the drunken simmer of his power and the helplessness of his victim. He meant to carve out her heart like a gross parody of some ancient sacrifice, as a bloody tribute to some god of rage and madness. It would hurt. It would be agony.

She did what she could to counter the chill of dread and fear, squeezing her eyes shut and biting hard at her lower lip, refusing to cry or plead for her life. Doing so would not have changed her fate. She was forced to wait, trembling despite her effort, for the sharp points to plunge into her chest and mar her to a bloody, mangled ruin.

A second streak of lightning drew great golden cracks across the sky. Unlike before, it was not preceded by the roiling fanfare of thunder; there was nothing but the snap of electric energy to bite deep into the darkness, as thought it were an answer to the flare of violet that had come mere minutes before. This magic, she knew, was not Azrael's. It came from another source, another direction, and its intent was not for the benefit of the darker forces at work that night. It was a distraction.

And it was very likely the timely intervention saved her life.

Malik's head snapped around, startled by the silent flash. He froze mid-motion, murderous intent gone still as his hand hovered over her chest, staring over his shoulder toward the origin of the new voice still faintly echoed by the faded light. His face bleached drastically of color in a sickly rush, replaced by a white-lipped fury.

"No…_no_—!"

At that precise moment, during the tremulous breath between impending death and the glimmer of hope, a force like a five-ton whirlwind slammed into them, knocking the demon's claws from her skin and wrenching him away from the girl he held captive.

Coiled fingers slid from her hair, the weight of her cage removed with such speed that she fell heavily to the cement. Both shoulders and hips throbbed with the dull pain of having been tossed aside like an obstacle; and she found herself sympathizing with postal packages, dazed and bedraggled. She pressed a hand to her chest with a breathless gasp, frankly astounded that it was still in one piece.

Her hand came away wet, and she examined her open palm to see five tiny spots of blood dotting her skin. But they were pinpricks, small and hardly a cause for worry.

Sitting up was painful, a chore undertaken with much ignoring of sore muscle and bruised bone. Yet she did it, wincing, feeling battered, and turned her head to stare, open-mouthed with a morbid, horrified fascination at the two men.

Locked in a vicious brawl the words for which humanity had no grasp, they tore at each other, savage with rage like animals in human form, fury and pure, undiluted hatred drew dark masks across their faces.

Malik had unveiled wings of his own; a pair of ragged appendages stained coppery red with blood to match his claws. Elongated talons slashed across the angel's exposed torso to leave long, shallow cuts that almost instantly healed, swallowing in upon themselves to seal the skin before the blood could well. He was brutal and primitive, utilizing a brutish, crushing strength to focus power into impact.

Yet as strong as he seemed, the demon couldn't quite keep up with Azrael's quicksilver retaliation.

Pale angelic limbs flew, knife-straight palms lashing out with a kind of ferocity that she had never seen in him before. He used a strange, graceful, arcing method to parry and counter and defend that was lethal when it hit; his strikes landed hard and solid upon the leather-shielded body at which he aimed. So hard in fact, that she could see Malik's body jerk beneath the impact. So hard that she could almost feel the magic sent coursing through the demon's flesh, targeting muscles and tender nerves.

Feathers dropped to the ground, ripped from wings as easily as leaves plucked from a tree branch, floating serenely down to be crushed underfoot as carelessly as paper. Black-tipped white and copper-scarlet dotted the black pavement; an unfitting synchronism to the livid strikes of combat.

Lilith looked on, voiceless and lodged in the delirium that could only be titled with terror, watching the two immortals, both righteous and fallen, as they dueled. Vaguely, though her shock, she could feel the hurt clenching deep in her heart. Yet somehow it did not seem odd that she was in real, physical pain to see her kind, gentle warden – her dutiful guide and protector – in such a coarse, violent frame of mind.

He had never acted in such a manner before, not in her presence. Even when dealing with those who had wished her harm, he had never been like this. In those moments he had been firm, controlled and discreet, rather like a strict, yet wisely reprimanding teacher; as though he had wished his naïve human opponents minimal harm.

Now, as he fought Malik with wrath hearkened to the Book of Revelations, beautiful eyes blazing pure with charred, scarlet fury, there was no mercy. There was no lingering trace of the soul she had come to expect when she looked at him, no hint of what had become familiar and befriended, just the dry, hollowed figure of something she had hoped never to see in reality. Death at its most brutal, and cruel.

At that precise moment, she felt fear towards him as she had not in weeks.

And beyond that small quiver of apprehension for the hand of divine judgment, she could feel her fear spike into something quite different. A part of her dreaded that something horrible – even more so than this – was about to happen.

In another flash, Malik was on his back, dazed by an effective remorseless series of strikes to his neck collar. He went sprawling, hitting the ground with the dead heft of lifeless meat, twitching as though his insides were subtly convulsing to protest their own weight. The lethal claws retracted as swiftly as a cat's back into his fingers. There he lay, smoldering eyes gradually recovering from the glaze of shock and Azrael stood over him, looming like a hunter over his prey, a single booted foot pressing firmly downward against the demon's chest.

With a growl reminiscent of a tempestuous gale, he spoke; and it was to press the very earth to its knees with the force of the compulsive power he fed like fire-fuel into the syllables. "If you _ever_ touch her again, I'll have your wings."

Malik arced back his forearm and slammed the edge of it into Azrael's ankle by way of response, trying to make the angel fall. And he did fall, but only to pin the hissing, spitting demon to the ground, crushing a knee into Malik's ribs, unrelenting in his display of strength.

Unlike the poised, elegant tactics of earlier, Azrael's retaliation was startlingly uncivilized. One hand curled into a fist, which he sent to connect solidly with the side of Malik's face. Judging by the noise and the force which split a vulnerable lip, the single strike would have killed a human. The demon's head snapped to one side, and a dark trickle of blood slid down the demon's chin to mingle with the stark crimson of his hair.

"Get off of me, you fucking traitor," Malik snarled, shaking his head to clear it and spitting onto the ground beside Azrael's left foot, braced into the cement at his side; both to empty his mouth of blood and to blatantly disrespect the angel's authority. "I'll touch whoever I please. Your bitch or someone else's, it makes no difference."

Azrael hit him again, harder this time, hard enough to have decapitated anyone with less capacity to withstand it. The thick, coarse crack of bones caused Lilith to shrink away, sickened and shuddering, yet unable to look away from the tiny rivers of blood running from Malik's nose and mouth, streaking his broken cheekbone like garish war paint. She remained enthralled by the scene that clouded her eyes like the scene from one of her worst nightmares, keeping her bound and gagged to the spot.

The angel's face was smooth and cold, merciless, pitiless, the soulless creature of a black, monstrous past. A mask of porcelain as formidable and awful as it was beautiful.

He filled an elegant hand with bloody crimson hair; forcing Malik to look directly into eyes that sparked with magic and empty, immeasurable darkness. "Did you hear me?"

His voice was dangerously composed, deadly calm, brutally and chillingly serious; woven thick with the tearing will to force an answer. Yet when Malik refused to respond his temper flared like a flame. He hissed, low and deep in his throat with the cadence of a darker, more sinister nature; a command that demanded to be obeyed.

"If you touch her again I will take you by the throat and rip the thrice-damned wings from your back. Do you understand?"

Her hands were shaking. She didn't know quite when it had started, having been put so efficiently half-smothered and shocked by the display of strength that seemed to drown the sky and weaken the ground beneath its sheer mass. All she knew was that her fragile, overwhelmed human body was quaking like a leaf in a windstorm.

Why? She had just come to a conclusion that was, so far, the queen mother of realizations she had been forced to make in the past month.

Azrael's build was lighter and fairer than that of his natural enemy, built for speed and endurance rather than crude, brutish strength. But there he crouched; poised, chin lifted and shoulders back, showing absolute, unwavering dominance over what appeared to be a far stronger male. He was power and divinity sent to rise above the ghouls from unholy passages stretched behind the marble eyes of priests and their precious books bound with deceptive spells.

Dusk shaded everything it touched, yet the white of his wings, arced against the night, remained as pure and bright as ever. The electric light streaked his hair with gold, shot the black edges of his feathers into depthless blackness, as though they had been dipped in tar.

He was so beautiful, even in anger. But his anger was not the only thing that struck her so sharply to the heart. Yes he was lovely, yes he was powerful and formidable; she had known all this beforehand.

What hit her then, stiff and scattered under her state of catatonia, was the fact that this awful, inescapable anger existed only because she had been threatened. This had nothing to do with him, nothing to do with a response to being insulted. It had nothing to do with pride or goodness or sincerity, or even the age-old battle of wills between the denizens, heavenly and hellish alike. It was for her.

He was _protecting_ _her_.

"_Do you understand me?"_

Azrael's voice rose to a deadly pitch, vividly and deliberately emphasizing the demanding question, relentless with enough magic to make the air shudder. His long white fingers pulled roughly to one side, wrenching the demon's head back and forcing the thick wave of compulsion down his throat.

Malik hissed with pain, but stubbornly refused to answer. He didn't even try to throw the angel off; just lay upon the frosty ground, silent, bloodied and glowering.

For that stretch of seconds the world seemed to slow to the point of freezing; held at a stand-still impossible to breach. It almost seemed like she was looking at a painting, a lovely, ominous image, but an image. Then she was gripped by the creeping feeling that she was no longer alone in her spectator's seat; a soft, tingling awareness brushing at the nape of her neck.

She twisted to the side, craning back her head to peer up at the figure that had appeared behind her, unsure whether to be worried or relieved.

Beelzebub stood, still and quiet beneath the halo of a flickering lamppost, silvery bangs trailing over his golden eyes like a punkish veil while he observed the scene of violence. For a moment she was stricken by surprise, wondering how on earth he had known to appear. Then it hit her, with a swift leap of estimation. He was there in response to the lightning-crafted message Azrael had sent him, calling on him for backup.

So why was that no comfort to her?

Something about him seemed wispy and fragmented, as though he had only just arrived on the ghostly wings of black vapor. What was even stranger still; he contained a soundless air of stoicism.

The prince's sly, foxy face was oddly blank, wiped clean of any hint of customary smirk or teasing smile. The jokes and puns which normally lined his lips were gone, replaced by a command, firm and succinct, which he addressed to the four black-haired, dark-suited men who flanked him like a uniformed honor guard forged straight from a mafia film.

"Separate them," he ordered, and his voice was stern, but tinged with something that sounded suspiciously like regret, cool and empty, and just slightly pained.

Moving like specters crafted from a ghastly fog, a pair of the guard rushed to obey.

They were nearly serpentine, striding with a subtle undulation that was almost beyond seeing, the harsh jewel tones of their black-slashed eyes so clearly demonic in nature that she almost expected them to sprout scaled tails and batlike wings from their expensive Armani suits. As a unit they seized Azrael by the upper arms and hauled him away from the pinned demon.

But the angel simply would not be restrained. He fought hard at their grip, hell-bent on slaking the thirst which demanded the lifeblood of the demon who had dared threaten his ward. Yearning to beat Malik to a shattered, boneless carcass fit for nothing but the carrion birds. The muscle in his torso strained, power flexing smoothly to wrest his way free, arching and twisting like a wild thing as they tried to hold him back.

Eventually it took one of the remaining two guards wrapping his arms around the infuriated angel's ribs and digging spectral heels into the cement to confine him.

Malik got gingerly to his feet, favoring his right side and snapping splintered bones back into proper alignment with a sickening jerk of his head. He needed no more than the one remaining guard's palm against his shoulder to deter him from moving, lest he venture in range of the angel's spirit-stripping aura of hatred.

A baleful, ember-eyed glance ventured toward Lilith, regarding her pale, shocked face with something that might have been surprise. Then his catlike eyes slid over her to rest upon his prince and his thin lips curled into a nasty sneer, displeasure and apprehension twisting his potentially attractive guise. It was not the look of an obedient subordinate. It was the look of someone laying blame for the failure he had suffered.

Choosing to ignore Malik's spiteful glare, the silvery prince gestured to the guard charged over the offending demon and bid quietly, "take him back to the levels."

Without another sound, Malik and his escort smoothly passed out of sight, simply blending into the fallen darkness of the evening with little more than a dispersion of light and matter.

Azrael's struggles had spiraled to a cease, having calmed with the absence of the demon he had pit himself so forcefully against. Without the threat to his charge's life to drive him, he stood quite still. The crackling, pulsing vibrato of aggression faded from the air, leaving his posture, face and eyes to a cooled, calm sort of resignation.

In contrast to the rage of before, he spoke gently, almost tiredly; "I'm not going anywhere, gentlemen. If you please…"

As a unit, the three guards serenely relinquished their restraints. They stepped away, hands clasped behind their backs and awaiting further instruction, leaving Azrael to stand, quiet and effortlessly lovely, at the center of their loose circle.

With a quiet rustle of clothing, Beelzebub abandoned his post by Lilith's side, striding gracefully forward to face the angel that was his closest friend.

Bewildered human eyes followed as his steps come to a stop before the white-winged soldier, noticing the stern, stiffened edge to his every guarded movement. It was suddenly very plain that this was not the playful, mischievous demon-spirit she found familiar. This was the Prince of Hell; royal, solemn and fated to pass judgment on the crimes and actions of others when his duty rose to break a calm water's surface. A duty few men could bear.

"Azrael…"

The demon's voice cracked, the faintest of slips to betray the emotion gnawing at him from beneath the smooth surface, and he cleared his throat before continuing smoothly onward.

"You have on this night broken the law between realms which states; _Without proven or justifiable cause, none of Heaven shall have sway over one of Hell, and none of Hell shall have sway over one of Heaven._ You are a denizen of the Holy Realm and are therefore forbidden to raise a hand to harm one under the Kingdom's protection under terms of peace. The sentence—"

Beelzebub grew silent, as though his voice had simply refused to cooperate with his intent. The lids of his tawny eyes closed, clever face wracked with a faint flicker of reclusive dislike that broached the mark of pain.

"Speak it, Highness," Azrael murmured, soft and conceding as the royal title smoothly replaced the demon's given name. "I will accept the consequences for my actions." The words passed without falter, but the clench of his elegant jaw belied the calm front.

Though it was spoken slowly and bolstered by a deep breath, the decree was shaped with a determination shadowed by many years of anger, conflict and frustration. The bearing of a born leader scorned by his father; forced to wear a mantle not rightfully his. Because without it there would be no one to represent order, even when that order bid him to punish a close companion, regardless of circumstance.

"The sentence tied to the break of this accord, Beelzebub proclaimed, the commanding notes ringing low and true in the stillness of the unnaturally empty night, "is termination."

Lilith's heartbeat stopped for a moment. It simply stopped, its beat stilling inside the clutches of horrified confusion. Her green eyes widened, her alarm spiking to a state of shock which threatened to explode into shards of incredulity, scarcely able to believe what she had just heard.

_Termination. _But that couldn't possibly mean what she had first pictured. It _couldn't_ mean execution. There was no feasible way her guardian could have been sentenced to death because of this – because of her.

The weight of her disbelief was powerful, and she managed to convince herself that it was all ceremonial, that no one was going to die. Yet as she glanced up at the Prince of Hell, to the passive Azrael, then back again, she felt a nasty, icy suspicion curdling inside her stomach.

She didn't want to believe it, but what else could she believe? Neither immortal man appeared to be anything but chillingly serious, each face composed and grave.

_T__his_ was what she had been warned about. Not his boundless, passionate nature or the starvation driving him into hurt and isolation, but his care. He had _cared_ so much for her that he had, as Beelzebub had predicted, sinned amidst the act of protecting her, to ensure she would stay safe within her rights as a regular human girl. Care that sought to keep his past from leaving a mark on her; care which would ultimately tear her apart.

He would die so she could live.

"_No!_" The cry came unbidden, birthed by her dread and the sickening plunge of her insides, the bile pooling so quickly in her throat that she thought she might throw up.

She couldn't let him die, couldn't let him suffer for saving her life, as he had so many times before, to let this indecency pass by unchallenged would be nothing short of a crime.

Lurching to her wobbly feet she stumbled toward them, the scent of anguish thin and high upon her breath. Her hands filled with Beelzebub's shirt, fingers curling into the close-fitting fabric, a plea embedded within her eyes that begged him to show mercy. "Please, don't do this…"

But the demon looked away, rejecting the reach of her gaze, and suddenly he didn't seem so familiar any more. The tight clutch of her grasp slid free as she stepped instinctively away, both dazed and shaken to the core by the notion that no one was going to help her. No one was going to listen to her, a human, weak and frail and voiceless to all the powerful people present. All but perhaps one.

Desperation seemed to squeeze the breath from her body as she turned to face her final option; to plead with her guardian to alter his choice, knowing that if he had the will, he could deny the charges and evade the chastisement laid at his feet.

For the first time in her life she prayed that her standing with him would sway that proud, noble façade, using every trick she could muster from wide, teary eyes to an already trembling mouth so she could encourage him rescue himself from such a fall from grace. "You can't just let him…Azrael, you _can't—!_"

A brief fraction of a second passed, during which he regarded her pretty face, so torn with emotions spanned from grasping hope to the depth of blackened despair. It gave her just enough time to catch the swift shift from deep, proud plum to palest, gray-tinged lilac before he, too, averted his gaze. "I will accept the consequences for my actions," he repeated, but this time the firm assurance came hand-in-hand with the softest tinge of sympathy and of sorrow.

He knew. It hurt her, and he knew, but it changed nothing. He wouldn't be rousing that righteous, valkyrine spirit to rebel again. She was alone. A tear slid down her cheek, hot like liquid mercury, and in its wake the last reserves of her bravery seemed to burn away.

Her heart throbbed inside her chest, an empty void of forsaken despair that jerked at something deep inside her physical body. She bit viciously down on her lower lip and ordered herself not to cry, because that was exactly the sort of weakness which had gotten him bound with a death sentence.

Azrael made a slight movement, a brief ripple of motion as though we were going to reach out and comfort her. But when another breath passed, he seemed to think better of it and remained where he stood, still and straight-faced as a statue carved of white marble. That simple hesitation, that offer of shelter and support that he withheld – something he had never before refused her – wounded more deeply than his refusal to deny his penance.

"Lilith," Beelzebub said, and his voice was softer than she had ever heard it before, surprisingly quiet for one who normally harbored such an intense energy and relish for life. "You may want to leave—"

She ignored his cautionary words, turning on him with a fury that was reckless with an anguished refusal to understand, choosing to leave the sorrow in his tawny eyes unnoticed. "He was _protecting_ me! How can you punish that—?"

But it was angel, not demon prince, who answered. "Malik was distracted. I had the opportunity to remove you from danger without further aggression, but I chose not to."

"That's not—"

"_Dura lex, sed lex,_" Azrael said softly, cutting through her protest, and while his voice was gentle there was a firmness threaded through it that fused the Latin syllables with iron. "The law is hard, but it is the law."

She knew those words, recognized them from something she had read or heard, and the way his speech curved with just a hint of that old-world accent that didn't quite follow the modernized translation chilled her to the bone.

Her feet moved without the aid of her conscious will, taking tentative steps toward him until the coolness radiating from his skin pressed against her, her breath brushing the arc of his collarbone. She lifted her hands to cup his beautiful, alabaster face. The tips of her fingers traced the sloping planes of his brow, temples and smooth, carved cheekbones with tiny, feathery caresses, soft and sweet to combat the bitter taste cloying in the back of her mouth. And somehow merely touching him helped ease the pain which pulsed beneath her ribs.

His eyes drifted closed, powerful hands easing from clenched fists and shoulders relaxing under his wistful cherishment of the delicate brush of her skin to his. He leaned into the cradle of her palms, soothed by the combing of her fingers through fine gold hair that wouldn't be tamed, his parted lips smoothing against the inside of her wrist.

The pitch of his voice was deeper than usual when he whispered, urgent with the instinctual desire to shield her from unpleasantly, "you should go. You don't want to see this."

Despite his words, a small part of her denied that she might have been splintering into pieces. Somehow it seemed that if she could just keep touching him, keep looking into that solemn, striking face, everything would be all right.

"You've always been there for me when I've needed…when I've asked." She swallowed thickly, crushing back the sob that threatened to press the breath from her throat. "I'm not leaving you now. I _won't _let them—"

"Tiberius. Restrain her."

So suddenly that it seemed to have come from nowhere, a firm hand took hold of Lilith's arm, attempting to direct her away from her guardian.

She yanked away from the eerie, reptilian-eyed guard, defensive and tense. Upon what seemed like the desperate instincts of a little girl wrapping her arms tightly around the angel's neck while trying to block out the growing pangs of horrible, choking dread which was screaming at the top of its lungs that something horrible was about to happen. Her grip was tight because of her fear, but rendered fragile by stress and the hapless tremors which came with it.

In the end, it made not a bit of difference.

Azrael didn't return her embrace, but she could have sworn that she felt the swift ghost of a tender kiss brush her forehead as the spectral man dragged her backwards and away.

She fought at the guard's grasp, clawing and writhing at the hands held solid at her forearm and middle; but to no avail. Her strength was thin, mortal and easily overpowered. There was nothing for her to do but keep her eyes riveted to the angel who wouldn't let her help him, soft, doe-sweet eyes pained by what she was still working so hard to deny.

"On your knees," Beelzebub's voice rang clear and cold. It was suddenly sharp as the command fell like a gavel-stroke through the thick, velvet winter black, taking up the mantle of the prince that he was, brimming with authority and regality worthy of his station.

Hardly a moment passed between the time the order was given and Azrael obeyed it to sink fluidly to his knees. He gazed placidly up at his friend, a shadow of pride sparkling in the depths of his eyes; a mild blush of darkness and swirling color amid the pallor of vapid, emotionless gray.

He knelt as though doing so was to display the valor of a man being knighted, wearing his dirty clothing and naked skin as though the finest of garments would have been too cheap or drab to suit him. Yet it was honor without arrogance, pride that opposed vanity. He wore them with grace, humility, and modesty, his head held high and his voice clear as morning bells when he bid softly: "do it."

Beelzebub's feet traced a tidy, no-nonsense circle upon the pavement, coming to a stop just behind the kneeling angel. With a gentle rustle of black-tipped feathers, Azrael's fair white wings lifted slightly from where they had been folded against his back, stretching as though offering some unspoken gift of trust which had Beelzebub eyeing them with an odd, vivid twist of aversion and regret.

An infinitesimal second floated by, a quiet breath of silence and peace. Then Beelzebub braced one hand against Azrael's shoulder and its partner closed around the base of one beautiful wing…and he pulled.

Lilith clapped her hands over her mouth to seal the scream inside. Her eyes were white-rimmed and wide with shock, horror and absolute, downright nausea as she stared, unable to look away.

The snap of the bone and tendon and the tearing of flesh shattered like glass against her ears. It harmonized by a rainfall of bright white feathers flecked with scarlet, tearing through her as though the sheer agony it represented had streaked through her own body. The beautiful, once whole wing seemed to wither like a dead thing. There it lay, on the ground where Beelzebub dropped it, bloody and dejected; a once pure and good thing now tainted with pain and cruelty.

Her eyes shot to Azrael as the second wing was torn from his back, when the immediate shock abraded into something that bled with more awful sorrow. She saw his handsome face contorted, white and wrought with agony, his entire body stiff with the effort not to retaliate as instinct demanded. By then, she was unable to hold back the sobs.

He made not a sound, but she gave voice to the pain that caused his strong body shudders reminiscent of ripples upon the smooth surface of a pool. Nor did he cry; his eyes were stark with pain but they were clear. So she cried for him, her tears sliding down her cheeks as she stared, aghast, at the act of abomination taking place before her.

They called this justice?

How could this be just: to torture and degrade a loyal emissary to the will of the merciful, loving deity who had given him life? As if he had done something worthy of such pain when he had done nothing more than protect what he cherished, just as he had been born to do. As if he had done wrong by preserving the health and safety of the charge ordained to him.

He didn't deserve to be treated like a criminal. There was nothing lawful or virtuous about this empty ceremony of blood and salt and anguish. What was it, but for a heartless sentence composed by cold, uncaring judges with poison and malice dripping from their fancy quills.

Marred and humiliated for his piety and virtue, breath ragged and shallow to hold back his cries. And they called it _justice? _There was no justice in this.

It was _wrong._

The clench of Beelzebub's jaw was severe, angles cast to sharp relief when he tossed the second broken wing to the ground. A pair of raw, torn gashes was left to mar the angel's shoulders.

He held out an open palm, at the center of which materialized the hilt of a sharpened, shining silver blade. Lovely in craft and art, it was an elegant weapon, slender and curved to breathtaking refinement, but the sight of it there in Beelzebub's hand, wreathed with the fading silver sparks from its summoning, was terrible. He hefted it expertly, regret and the wordless wish for different circumstances softening his expression for the briefest of moments.

A split second later, his tawny eyes hardened and he shoved the sleek weapon through Azrael's bloodied, shirtless back.

She _did_ scream then; so loudly and with such force that her voice tore itself to silence within her own throat. Something inside her chest splintered, and the pressure was so intense that it felt as though her heart had cracked inside an empty ribcage, as if_ she_ had been the one run through.

Needle-sharp barbs of pain pierced her lungs, lodging in her throat, shards of glass tearing through her insides. It bled her dry and raw, weeping, mute, eyes fixed to the tip of the blade which had passed right through her angel's chest, the sharp silver veiled with vulgar red, parting his smooth white flesh as easily and carelessly as butter.

Yet the look on Azrael's face was that of tranquil calm. He looked so peaceful, so utterly accepting of his fate, even with a sword forced through his repentant body, as though he was oblivious to being impaled. His fair golden head tilted back just slightly as if in passionate expectation, his lips lifted in a soft smile. Sliding to a shade of purple so pale that it was almost bleached to whiteness his eyes met the horizon hidden to mortal-kind's blindness.

He lingered on the border for a moment, as though he might overcome the fatal blow. But the life was already fleeing from the battered earthly shackle, his torso tipping forward before he finally surrendered to it.

He fell – the stillness of death accented with a lingering trace of inhuman grace. The flow of blood ebbing into nothingness, his breath stilled, the prayers for acceptance and relief lodged within his final, dying sigh.

Without a word, Beelzebub took back his weapon, the blade sliding with a morbid whisper from unresponsive flesh, and allowed it to vanish back to wherever it had come from. The spell faded into a silence that hung heavy with an undeniable remorse. He turned away from the angel's body, lines of anguish shadowing his hardened face.

All of a sudden the reality of it struck her solidly in the stomach, as though the motion of Beelzebub putting his back to his friend had been the final sign.

Azrael was well and truly gone. There would be no laughter, no warm smile, he wouldn't sit up to hold out his arms for her and smooth the hair from her cheeks, reassure her with that patient, gentle voice of his and murmur, _only teasing, sweetling._ It wasn't going to happen. She would never hear that ridiculous little pet-name again. The irony was that the prospect of going the rest of her life without hearing it lined her insides with ice.

The compulsion to return to her guardian was completely overpowering, and Lilith found that her efforts to wrench away from captivity tripled beneath it. Unreasonable as it seemed, she had no other choice but to fight. She twisted inside the tight grip of the guard, writhing and clawing, beating at his hands and shoulders, beside herself with reasonless, miserable disbelief.

Yet while her body squirmed and kicked and she shoved her elbows into firm flesh and scratched at the vaguely serpentine face, her eyes remaining fixed on the motionless form of Azrael.

Beelzebub glanced toward Tiberius. "Let her go," he said softly, the order passing with a smooth, level note of understanding.

"But My Prince—"

"I said," the demon prince's voice rose to a dangerous level and tone. Not simply by sound, but by cadence and depth to serve as a thinly-veiled reminder that only a fool would argue directly with a Hellish monarch. "_Release_ her."

The guard obeyed immediately, not daring to anger his master further.

The very instant his grip went slack she tore from him, stumbling forward and spilling, boneless, shivering, to her knees at the fallen angel's side. She reached out with trembling hands to grasp his shoulders, her face apprehensive, fearful of seeing him absent the fruitful thrum of life he should have had.

Yet she had to know. Thus, she heaved the solid weight of him onto his back and looked down. Skin that was normally so pale and lovely had taken on an ashen hue, deathly white, not the shade of smooth alabaster she knew. Dirt and blood streaked his fair hair. Translucent lids had closed over purple eyes, the lashes drawn and shadowed; leaving no trace of the gentle smile that had graced his lips only a few scant moments before. Nothing left but an empty husk remained.

The sight broke something deep inside her.

A wailing cry of pure, undiluted grief ripped from the depths of her soul, a sound to shame any banshee. So strong was the voice of her mourning that she was barely conscious of just how much she gave, sheltered as she was by the forceful fragmenting of her sanity.

She collapsed, limp and sprawling across Azrael's body, burying her face in his blood-smeared chest. Sobs caused her frail body to shudder and her fingers clutched at his shoulders. She clung as though he were a lifeline to her own salvation, seeking something that might tie her to the stone cold flesh so quickly succumbed to rigor mortis.

And still she cried, empty of any embarrassment to be seen as a blubbering mess by strangers. Anguish, pain and anger tore through her without restraint, knowing only the loss of the only person who had ever loved her without a single condition.

Beelzebub's stern resolve softened as he gazed down at her, golden hawk's eyes tinged with sorrow. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. And though she knew he truly meant it, in his way, her rage was anything but soothed.

Her glare was vivid and brutal when she threw back her head, eyes red-rimmed, cheeks streaked salty with tears. They dripped from her trembling chin to splatter Azrael's chest with shiny, wet splotches. "How could you?" she choked, her fury deep enough to scald. She spoke as though the very sight of him offended her, as though he had betrayed her, thrown her to the wolves. "He was your friend! _How __could__ you?"_

He had the decency to lower his head, wilting slightly beneath the whipping accusation. "I had to. It's my duty to—" He cut himself to silence before meeting her heartsick eyes, letting her see there the depth of empathy he couldn't verbalize. "I _am _sorry. But you wouldn't understand even if I told you."

She looked away from him, disgusted by the pitiful explanation and by the grief twisting like a knife until it seemed to hollow out a jagged hole inside her chest, and turned her eyes back to her warden's face. Her fingers trailed down his smooth cheek with a wistful fondness mirrored in her teary green eyes. "You saved me so many times," she swallowed another wretched sob, "I couldn't even help you once."

Beelzebub shot her a look that was startled with alarm. Shaken from his respectful quiet, he dropped to one knee beside her, pressing sternly, "This is not your fault! Azrael knew what he was doing when he challenged Malik. He knew the law, what the punishment would be, and he accepted that. It isn't your fault."

Reaching out to put a consoling hand on her shoulder, Beelzebub was surprised when Lilith recoiled, pulling away from his grasp.

Her slim arms wound about Azrael's heavy body and cradled him to her chest, her body hunched protectively over his torso and pressing her face into the curve of his neck. One delicate hand slid upward to support the back of his neck as though he were merely peacefully sleeping…as though to be parted would destroy her.

But the demon would not be brushed off. After a short, terse huff of breath, his arms wound around the mortal girl's waist and hauled her to her feet, pulling her around to look her in the eyes.

"Let _go—!_"

"Listen to me." Beelzebub's voice was firm but gentle, and within it resided the care and patience of a monarch who knew and understood the pains of his subjects. "I've known Azrael," he sighed, "all my life. And I know—probably better than most—the last thing he'd ever want is for you to waste your time and energy in grief for him."

Her tear-reddened eyes were huge and forlorn. She stared up at him, managing the weight of his gaze for only a moment before her gaze lowered, lower lip trembling with the effort to keep her childish crying at bay.

He was right. Carrying on like this in the middle of a public street (even sans people) would do no credit to the angel, nor would pouring her heart out to an empty sky. She would be brave. It would be the very least she could do for the memory that lingered, the haunting spirit of the faith that would never again be whole.

"That's a girl," Beelzebub praised with a thin silver smile, giving her a loose, one-armed hug around the shoulders.

"Now chin up," he stepped to one side, clearing the way to the half-forgotten road that led northeast toward her solitary apartment, tilting his head to murmur with the tiniest hint of command, "and don't look back."

The urge to turn back was terrible and strong, but Lilith took a deep, shaking breath and did as advised, taking slow, measured steps down the deserted sidewalk to her home. The prince didn't accompany her, nor did he follow to be certain she went, understanding that it was a bridge she needed to cross herself. He merely watched her until his unearthly sight could no longer pick out her silhouette, solemn with an extension of silent sadness for her pain.

She had barely made it into her living room by the time the convulsions began, and had just enough time to scramble to the bathroom before her stomach purged itself of everything she had eaten.

The sight and smells of violence had caught up with her, permeated her shock to rack her with rolling waves of nausea; the kind that gripped at her middle and squeezed. She remained there, half seated and half crouched on the bathroom floor, clutching at the toilet, for a full ten minutes before she gathered the energy and the courage to get up, shed her clothes, and drag herself to the shower.

At first the water soothed her frost-chilled skin, the soap and shampoo washed away the dirt, grime and blood. Yet she was strangely unreceptive to the comfort of the cleansing heat.

She continued to shiver, feeling as though a coal of ice had been wedged into the place her heart had been, chilling her from the inside outwards. Soon she caught herself yearning for the water and steam to become the solid, steady warmth of familiar flesh to embrace her. She wished for her hands to be replaced by a larger, stronger pair to flush the ice from her blood, wished for pale, scar-traced fingers to brush away her tears, knowing perfectly well that her dreaming was a waste.

Despite her valiant effort to pull her thoughts away from him, she found no success. A black, gaping hole had eaten through the center of her chest, and nothing she could do would turn her away from it.

No matter what she did, no matter how much she scrubbed, the facts burned at her like a hot-iron branding her senseless.

Such a bleak emptiness loss made…he had never mentioned just how dark it was.

She felt the loss of him like a piece of her had been ripped out; the angel who had cared for and protected her since before she could consciously remember. He had answered every one of her silly, girlish questions, had gifted her with precious laughter, made her feel loved and important, blanketed her in security and contentment. When she had been in the shelter of those strong arms, she had been sure that nothing could ever harm her.

"Enough," she snapped at herself, furiously scrubbing at her own hair. "He's gone and he is _not_ coming back no matter what you'd like to think, you _stupid_ girl…"

The tears were coming again, hot and heavy, and while she squeezed her eyes tightly shut to drown them, she just didn't have the strength. It had been worn away by the grief; an acid eating away at any fragments of control she could still cling to. Eventually she gave in and lost herself amidst the bleeding of her battered, bruised and decimated faith, her tears invisible among the drops of water dispersed by the showerhead on her down-turned face.

She could see it now; how she had focused so completely and resolutely on the potential risk of a relationship that she had never dared to look at how much good could have come from it. Not until he was gone.

In darkness and doubt, like a morning that came without the sun, she could imagine what might have been had she let down her shields – protections so useless in the end. It served her right to feel such consuming, blinding pain. It served her right to lose something so precious, because she hadn't deserved him. She never had.

Thirty long, awful minutes later found Lilith curled up in her bed stark naked, too bone weary to redress, all the blankets she owned piled on top of her in the hopes of gathering some sort of strange, elusive warmth that kept slipping just beyond her reach. Slumber was uneasy, pieced together with lonely dreams and sad murmurings that warped into nightmares forged from crying and internal injury too deep for words.

Restless fingers groped at her clean sheets, searching for the Presence that should have been somewhere near in her hour of distress. But it was gone, without a flicker of substance left to console her.

She woke often, confused and saddened, and remind herself to call in to work for a sick-day, so she could keep bleeding until the hurt ran dry. Then she would lie back again, curled and miserable, drifting off into that troubled resting state once more to toss and turn, and whisper a phantom's name.

"Azrael—"

_All you have to do is call, and I will come._

"Azrael…"


	31. Beautiful Imperfection

**Chapter 30  
**Beautiful Imperfection

Recommended Listening: "Everything" by Lifehouse

* * *

Lilith didn't know what time it was when she regained consciousness. All she knew was that it was dark and that, at long last, she was warm, despite the relentless ache searing deep and black in her chest. It was long past sunset, judging by the muted hue of the light which peeked in through the curtains she hadn't drawn, which led her to believe that she had, indeed, slept for almost a full twenty-four hours.

This was nowhere near as surprising as it should have been, but she couldn't bring herself to care. The strength had been sapped out of her, leaving her shaky, sluggish and indifferent to pretty much everything, weighted by the burden she didn't want to think about.

She ached in ways that weren't purely physical. Her bumps and bruises were mostly faded, yet it still felt as though she had been treated to the worst pummeling of her life and dragged through a patch of iron thorns. Then there was the pain that throbbed at the spaces between her ribs, as deep and resounding as though a six-inch pole had been thrust through her chest.

It was as though every tiny, insignificant trace of hurt she had ever felt in the course of her life had flooded back to her, concentrating in that place where her heart lay until she could no longer feel it beat. The rhythm had been replaced by the pain.

It wasn't clear how long it would take to recover once she forced herself to process the horrible events from the night before. But she would ultimately have to if she wanted to survive it. While thus far the memories had avoided her hideous nightmares, yet she knew very well that when the grieving took its course, it might very well consume a piece of her amidst the sobs.

For the moment, however, there was no choice but to let it be. She had neither the focus nor the energy to dwell on it – at least not until she could lift her chin and face the heinous nature of the sin she had committed.

Later, when the hour wasn't quite so ungodly, she would call April to ask for that day of leave…or perhaps a week. She didn't think she would have a problem sounding sick enough to warrant a week off. But for right now, all she wanted was to lie there in the warmth of her bed, where there were no worries, no fears, and nothing that could hurt her worse than the raw remnants of those festering wounds.

Ragged and torn, she resigned to cloister herself away between clean, indifferent sheets, wondering if she had ever felt so inescapably wretched.

She rolled over, the flutter of her breath fanning across her pillow, and reached out to embrace the warmth of her blankets once again. But she didn't feel wool or cotton. Instead, her wayward hand touched something smooth and firm, cool and slightly curved to the touch. Something she couldn't recall ever having felt in her bed before.

The surface moved under her hand, shifted to press slightly nearer to where she lay. Her eyes slid open, puzzled, only to stare with alarm as the bare flesh of the male body lying close beside her stretched with a languid, luxurious relish.

She snatched her hand away from the strong, muscled chest as though it had burned her, fear snapping inside her like hot, warning flames. Wondering and terrified of something she had been determined never to face again, she clutched the nearest blanket to her bare body in order to form a barrier of some kind between herself and the intruder.

What was this strange man doing in her apartment – in her _bed?_ And why, in God's name, couldn't these ghosts from that other world leave her alone? Hadn't they drunk their fill of her misery yet? Hadn't she paid them enough in sweat and heart-blood?

The bitterness of her resentment helped fend off her fear, heating it to the scalding temperature of anger.

"Good morning, Sweetling."

The voice was a low alto, slightly husky as though from a minor lack of use and hauntingly familiar; so much so that it struck a painful chord in Lilith's heart. Where had she heard it before? Surely she should remember such a voice, one so pure and rich and colorful, because no one could have imagined such music.

It was then the man sat up, propping his torso upright with one powerful arm, and with that simple movement his features were made clear by the light which spilled across his face. Her eyes widened, her mouth dropping open from pure, incredulous shock.

He lazed like a moon-kissed apparition, pale gold hair loose and tousled around his carven face. Expectant and open, he regarded her, his elegant lips curved with a smile that was warm and slightly sleepy, as though she had woken him with her restlessness; a feat which wouldn't have required much effort. They had lain so close in the full-size bed that anything more than breathing would have roused the newly dead.

And, miraculously, his chest was whole. It had been marred and bloody, split by the wound speared through it just the night before. Yet now there was nothing, not a scratch, not a stain, no mark at all upon the smooth flesh that was so lovely and alive.

_Alive._

For one brief, glorious second an overwhelming joy lifted her heart from the blackness of despair. A moment later, the euphoric swell of happiness sank, engulfed by the rising flood of impossible grief. Azrael was dead. She had watched him die, cradled his lifeless body, cold and without heartbeat, an empty shell left behind in the wake of a spirit leaked from flesh.

Knowing Beelzebub and the likelihood of the demon prince's straying toward whatever mercy he could offer his friend, the sword had probably cut through his spine. Such a blow would have severed the chord to life and to pain simultaneously. Merciful, but absolute. There was no way he could have lived through that – _no_ one could. It had been a killing blow; and no matter how much of a storybook hero he had always seemed to be, there was no feasible way Azrael could have escaped his fate.

If that was true, who exactly was this heartless copycat?

Her green eyes narrowed, sharp and angry. Pushing herself away from the intruder, she snapped harshly, "Get out," pain clawing raw at her dry, hoarse throat.

"Lilith, what—"

He sat up fully, powerful stomach muscles contracting, and reached out a hand to touch her shoulder, concern rising in subtle waves to shade the air around them.

A surge of fear entwined with the incredulity that surged from her bruised insides with the fury a gale. "Don't touch me!" She all but shrieked, clutching the blanket more tightly to her chest and shoving still farther back to deny the lying villain's reach.

There were just some things that shouldn't be done for the sheer indecency. This was one of them. Was this an attempt to punish her after such a bludgeoning tragedy, as if she didn't already know the shame in what she had done? This was heartless; and to hell with God or the Devil, and all of them, she wasn't going to put up with it anymore.

Nearly beside herself with convulsive rage, her voice shook, lilting to a near-hysterical pitch. "How _dare_ you come in here—impersonating the man I love!"

She didn't stop to think about what had just leapt from her mouth. It didn't occur to her to stop and wonder why she had used such a delicate, dangerous word, and even if she had, it wouldn't have been replaced. He had been her angel and yes, somehow despite herself, she _had_ loved him.

How could it hurt so terribly, otherwise to see his face framing such a lie?

The impostor's expression tightened with surprise, features wiped starkly blank, stunned silent for almost a solid breath. Then the firm lines softened to bestow her with a smile so cursedly beautiful it might have made the very stars sink to tears.

He reached for her, his hand sliding along the thick weave of her protective blanket, his arm wrapping around her waist, clearly intending to drag her back toward his embrace. But no liar's arms could heal her now. She would rather consume rat poison than let this charlatan desecrate her fleeting memories of unconditional love.

She fought him fiercely, shoving at the grip around her middle, lashing out like a wild thing to beat against a firm chest and unyielding shoulders. Her feet and fingers scrabbled against the sheets for leverage. But the effort to escape was futile. She wasn't strong, easily overpowered, and was inevitably hauled across the bed. Furious tears stung the corners of her eyes, anguished and cursing her fate for having been born such a flimsy, anemic little weakling.

"No! Let _go_ of me!"

An agile hand splayed against her back to keep her pinned against his side, its partner cupping her stubborn chin in a grip as flexible as a vice. Yet the touches were gentle. He cradled rather than forced when he coaxed her to look up and meet a pair of rich, vibrantly violet eyes, and it was though any strength she had was leeched from her bones.

_Those eyes_…why hadn't she noticed before?

It was impossible – simply impossible. He was _dead._ She had watched with horror and anguish as the wings were torn from his back and the breath ripped from his lungs. But there he was; restraining her rebellion, a deep, genuine concern etched into his smooth, angular features.

She was half ready to sink back into her certainty that the form was a guise when suddenly, almost fleeting, she recalled what he had once – perhaps absentmindedly – told her about shapeshifters. Those with the ability were capable of mimicking the shape, coloring and voice of any person they chose perfectly. Everything but the eyes; they couldn't change their eyes. It was because of that flicker of remembrance that made her believe that this was no imitation.

"It can't be," she breathed, hardly able to force the words free for the tremble of her lips. "You're…I watched you—_saw_ you _die_…"

Azrael smiled softly down at her, his cautious grip around her waist loosening, content that she was at no further risk of maiming herself via her own thrashing. "If I could die as easily as you believed, then how would I have survived the millennia before your birth?"

Lilith stared, stunned, feeling as though she had been force-fed enough air to set both her mind and her heart afloat inside her flesh.

"My real body was never injured. Only my spirit was hurt, punished through application of pain as is written by law. The body that was destroyed was no more than a shell, a tool I used to have substance in this world. When a shell form isdestroyed, the soul—the essence, spiritual energy, or whatever you choose to call it—is sent back to the heavens, where it reassumes its true form."

His smile dimmed. In its place there came a somber intensity that sank into her eyes, so real and earnest that it seemed to physically scoop her right from the pits of despair. "Did you truly think a trivial thing like death—my _own_ element—could keep my love from you?"

He lifted a hand to tuck a stray tendril of hair from her face, and with that gentle touch, that soft, tender, doting assurance, the idiocy of her assumptions washed over her.

How on earth could she have been so utterly foolish to let the trauma of what she had witnessed suspend her common sense? Honestly. He was _immortal,_ an angel of God, Hell could freeze over and he would never truly leave her. He could speak of destroyed bodies and soul transmutation and whatever else until the end of the world, but nothing would ever matter more than knowing his bond to her was real in more than just this brief, temporary plain of existence.

With that last strand of acceptance to serve as her conduit, Lilith lost every trace of resolve she had.

Shuddering and deep, her gasp shuddered its way to the surface. As though a dam set somewhere inside her had given way, tears yet unshed from the night before, sorrowed and painful and sharp, began to stream down her cheeks. And without another word she threw her arms around his neck, buried her face in his shoulder and surrendered to the tears.

He accepted it without a single murmur of complaint, understanding her need for comfort and the time to bleed the poison of grief from her poor, overwhelmed body. He let her to cling to him, let her tears drip onto his skin.

Not once did it occur to her to ask him why he had allowed her believe the ritual execution to be permanent. She either couldn't spare the energy to do so, or it simply no longer mattered to her in the grander scheme of things, for which he was grateful. The toll his half-formed test had taken on her tore at his tender insides. Brutally enough that he wished he had never wondered what she might do if she believed him gone.

Such crippling devastation he had not expected, and to see her so wounded by his actions reached inside his chest and squeezed. But he let the matter rest, knowing that revealing his reasons now would only confuse and trouble her whilst in such a fragile emotional state.

Keeping one arm firm and secure around her waist to support her heaving back, he stroked the soft dark hair back from her forehead. "_Torien, I' liu,"_ he whispered soothingly, the lush, musical tones of his native tongue like a balm to the very air. "_Ahn'e saran." _

_I'm here. I will never leave you again, I promise._

Though her tears were deep and her sobs racked hard at her chest, Lilith felt strangely at peace as she cried into his curve of his neck, listening to the soothing cadence of his half-sung comforts. The refuge of his arms gave her sanctuary, a safeguarding promise of protection against her own personal demons. His warmth was a salve to the illness passed to her through the unresponsive flesh that she had left behind upon cold cement.

Her fingers curled around his broad shoulders, clutching almost desperately, refusing to let him slip away a second time. She focused on the steady pattern of his breath beneath the cool skin pressed against her cheek, letting it lull her like the harmony of a child's lullaby.

Still he held her, soothing her sobs with his calming presence, not caring a whit about the warm, salty liquid that trailed down one arm, fingers combing through her hair to offer her peace and relief. And she knew then that she would never, not in a hundred thousand years, find another person who would make her feel so safe or so precious. He was her angel. There could be no one else for her.

For the severity of her trauma, it wasn't long before her sobs morphed into timid sniffles, and she pulled away, swiping self-consciously at her eyes and cheeks. "I'm sorry," she mumbled, "I got you all wet…I must look terrible—"

"Shh," he touched a finger to her lips to hush her feeble apologies. "Nonsense. You are _always_ beautiful to me."

He gazed tenderly down at her; eyes darkened just a hair to the beautiful blue-violet shade that he showed only to her. The tips of his fingers trailed down her cheek, tucking under her chin and tilting her face up towards his with a soft, loving caress.

The impulse was startling, a strong, compelling desire to wrap her arms back around his neck and blindly accept the kiss that he was visibly aching to give her. But one single, wicked glimmer of a thought kept her from blissfully drowning in the darkening depths of his eyes, and although she wanted to ignore it, her fickle sense of propriety simply refused to let it go.

"I—I'm not wearing anything…" She murmured faintly, wondering vaguely why it mattered.

"Neither am I," he breathed, leaning nearer, his lips so close to hers that she could almost taste the rich, heady flavor of his mouth. She glanced almost reflexively downward and saw the sheet fold casually, dangerously low to rest just under the defined ridges of his hips. "What difference does it make?"

Her eyes widened, momentarily winded by the impact of her heart leaping to lodge inside her throat. In another moment she was on her feet beside the bed, blanket tucked modestly around herself, miraculously still managing to remain covered. Voice trembling and meek, she mumbled, "I…um, excuse me."

Lugging the thick woven wool with her, she escaped into the bathroom. Though she tried to ignore the haphazard thunder of her heart against her ribs and the piercing heat of his eyes following her every step, she didn't quite succeed. Indulging in a deep, steadying breath, she braced her hands against the counter and leaned over the sink.

Honestly, she wasn't sure what had just happened. She hadn't been frightened, but she had felt unsure, nervous with him being so near and admitting to an absence of clothing.

It was just that she had never been in such close vicinity with a completely naked man before. Angel or no, he still possessed a man's form – and she wasn't sure how to handle that knowledge. He was always so passionate, so intense, an open channel to the tiniest and barest traces of emotion in his immediate area, a living conduit to fluctuate every spark of her feeling. And he had essentially just come back to life, resulting in a generous quantity of emotion.

If she had let him kiss her…what if things had escalated as they always seemed to? With her emotional state being so fragile and with him being so newly energized and fresh, who knew what could happen. What if the situation rose to a level she wasn't entirely sure about?

"Surely you must know by now that you can't hide from me."

Lilith jumped, letting out a startled squeak of alarm, her hands instinctively lifting to clutch the blanket protectively to her chest. Two powerful arms wrapped snugly around her waist, the brunt of Azrael's weight pushing her slightly forward to hold her securely between the sink counter and the front of his own body.

She inhaled sharply at the press of his muscular abdomen against her bottom, the brush of his thighs against her own, all warmth and strength, smooth, satin skin. Standing thus, it was clear that he was, indeed, completely naked. No clothing formed a separation between hips and legs as had seemed to be his mandatory custom with her; there was nothing but her blanket to keep his flesh from her.

"I can feel you."

He spoke ever so softly against her neck. His breath was as warm as his hands when they traced up her arms, trailing delicate patterns across the skin with deft, agile fingertips. Speechless, she watched him through the mirror, half mesmerized by the swirling movements that left her nerves tingling and starved, because somehow the touch was not enough.

"Forgive me for frightening you, it was not my intention. Please understand—it is difficult for me to be restrained when you are dressed as such. It is very…" He paused, searching for the right word, the delicate courtesy in his speech more pronounced than it ever had before, almost formal in cadence.

"Tempting," he finished softly, and his touch skimmed wistfully across the backs of her hands – clasped tightly over her chest – with a tender, reassuring gesture. "But no matter how difficult it is, I _will not_ force you to do anything you don't want."

He spoke as though his own word was a binding chain, another link added to his own seemingly limitless self-control. The decision held the weight of an oath upon his tongue. Lilith heard the sincerity in his voice, felt him start to back away as though to fade into the background, and a strong surge of affection seemed to lace through the layers of her chest. The very depths of her soul seemed to sing in reply to the melodic assurance etched into the facets of his bell-like tone.

Even now, when she was naked and vulnerable within his reach, he was determined to ensure her comfort regardless of what he wanted. He wouldn't to press her, refused to put her in any situation that overreached the extent of her personal limits.

Down to her core, she believed the unspoken promises. This man would never hurt her, nor would he ever cross those invisible lines of propriety without her explicit consent to guide him. Without a doubt, without a single hint of question, she knew that she could trust him with anything and everything.

Faced with such devotion, raw and sensitive to every reality she had ever hid from herself after the agonized certainty that she had destroyed him, she was forced to face just how much she truly cared for him.

She _loved_ him. And she didn't want him to go.

The imminent departure made her feel lonely and cold, abandoned anew so soon after finding her personal shepherd, as though his nearness was what allowed her to see any light at all. "Wait," she pleaded faintly, grabbing for his hands before they were withdrawn beyond her reach, "don't stop."

Azrael stiffened behind her, and for a moment she wondered if maybe her response had been the wrong one. But a split second later he had relaxed, complying with her wish by stepping forward to mold her to his body, locking her in place between wood and flesh.

It was not a restraining action, but one of shelter and security, of ardent, wistful feeling that had all the harshness of a feather. She eased into his embrace, feeling the firm press of his chest against her bare back. His hands skimmed along her arms to rest atop her bare shoulders, lips brushing against the sensitive curve of her neck. She reveled in the attention, letting her eyes drift closed to bask in the loving touch of her angel. Touch had hadn't realized she missed so dearly.

Entranced by the closeness, the sensation of his skin warming steadily where it touched her, eager to be closer the beautiful creature showing her such cherished tenderness, she lifted her hands from where they guarded her chest. Up and back they crept, sliding tentatively over the knuckles of the fingers resting against her collar to cradle the base of his head in her palms.

She threaded her fingers through Azrael's silky golden hair, savoring the spill of it through her hands and the stroke of the downy feathers at his nape. He made a quiet, approving murmur against her temple, a sound like a large contented cat purring low in his throat, and let his hands trace her ribcage to take her by the waist, seeming simply fascinated by the soft, yielding curves of her body.

Faintly, absently, she wondered how long it had been since he had last touched a woman. Apart from the little, accepted touches dictated to men by polite society in the older days, kisses to the hand, dancing, and the like; because that really didn't count. It must have been a very long time ago to warrant such a reverent kind of awe.

The blanket loosened, slipping from its place, and the slight chill of the air dragged her focus to her state of near-nakedness, and how problematic it could be.

But she was allowed only a small time for uncertainty. A moment later the angel broke her out of her musings by touching one endearing hand to her cheek and pressing his lips to the delicate column of her throat.

She gasped aloud, the tiny sound of surprise leaping from her mouth, an electric shock snapping through her body in tune to the careful graze of his teeth against her tender skin. It was unlike anything she had ever felt before; a gesture that was doting, almost toeing the line to becoming worshiping. For all the arguing her paranoia could have done to convince her that this was frightful and unclean, she didn't feel disturbed.

In fact, it gave her _pleasure._ A tingling, honeyed joy poured warmth from the crown of her head to the very tips of toes that curled with felicitous relish.

He was so gentle, a feat that was still fascinating to a girl who had known the touch of abuse. How frighteningly easily he could cause her pain, cause her _harm_ by pushing just a little harder. Radiating power, without weakness or inhibitions, how easy would it be for him to simply take her by the neck with a single hand and snap her spine cleanly in two?

But of course he did nothing of the sort.

Those hands, the very same hands she had once witnessed split the skull of a mortal man were soft, loving, longing…desiring. She couldn't help but respond. The woman within her, the one so irrevocably bound to him, wouldn't stand for staying quiet, no matter if she thought it was her surrendering silence that he wanted. "Azrael…" she whispered, the name rolling off her tongue as though it was the taste of something familiar, comforting and delicious.

He drew back just long enough to pull her around to face him, the sound of his name – not a title, not a curse of fear or revulsion – pitching him headfirst into a heated spell of want. Avid and vibrant, that wanting slammed into his senses, hard enough to daze. The compulsion was so strong that he barely had time to gather enough willpower to retain a semblance of control, just able to keep from slinging her across the sink and tearing away the thin wool to bare her young body to the air.

She could have been a goddess, sweet and chaste, bewitching his good intent into a maddening twist of fantasy and sinful reality. The gentle scrape of her fingernails against his scalp mixed with the soft scent of lilies that rose from the tender skin at her wrists and throat, threatening to drug him senseless. He had no strength now, no trace of the binding left to restrain the carnal desire for flesh, sweat and innocence.

She, with all her naivety and loveliness, had doomed herself. She had never stood a chance – not against the fierce possession that had replaced his mocking farce of paternal guardianship.

It had been her smell that had sealed her fate, sweet, floral and delicious. She had always possessed the most captivating scent, snaring his senses, urging him to kneel at her feet and beg for more than just a brief, tantalizing taste. It had haunted him since she had been fourteen, when the warm, faintly metallic hint of blood had proven her a woman. Despite the guilt that had torn his insides to a mangled ruin, it had lingered in his mind, until the scent of lily had been enough to fill him with yearning.

With every year it grew richer every year, as she had in loveliness. But that only meant that the slightest breath carried with it the scent of her skin, and the desire that coupled it.

All he wanted was to make her understand what she did to him, the seven years of havoc she had wreaked upon him. To worship her in ways that he hadn't dared before. He wanted her lips against his, her arms around his neck, her legs around his waist, and he wanted her _now._

Put off balance by being guided into turning so quickly, Lilith instinctively braced her hands against his chest, feeling the blanket twist around her legs. Her body curved gracefully to fit to the shape of his muscular form, and the flesh she met was rigid and firm with an urgency that startled her. She blinked up at him, dazed, feeling oddly light-headed, absently watching his piercing eyes close as his lips descended on hers with all the flaming fury of a burning star.

No time was wasted by playing chaste or polite. Azrael knew what he wanted, and what _she_ wanted, even if she didn't know it herself. Instead, he kissed her with a focus that quite literally robbed the breath from her unsuspecting lungs.

There was no mercy, no forgiveness. His mouth was a sweet, captivating prison that nudged every shaky female safeguard aside. His lips were pliant marble, his tongue a lick of fire that swept between her defenses, brazenly abducting her better sense with nothing but heated, sensual tenderness.

Unaccustomed to such fervor, she struggled to keep up with him, unsure of what to do and fumbling under the persuasion wearing her resistance thin. But he was patient, guiding her along with a practiced ease, smiling fondly at her attempts to match his intensity. Her inexperience was evident, but countered by her effort, for every cautious, delicate stroke of her lips caused him to burn.

Yet she was running out of breath, her fragile lungs strangers to such pressure. He could sense the light-headed spell of dizziness; feel the gradual weakening of her knees, the heaviness of her limbs. She was human, after all, and unlike him, she had to breathe.

With colossal effort, he pulled away from the warm, moist softness of her mouth, every nerve in his body tingling, aching, crying out with protest to the lack of contact. He forced a shaky exhale, attempting to relocate his forsaken sanity, and lowered his head just slightly to press his mouth to the slim curve of her neck.

The rapid pulse of her heartbeat fluttered against his skin, the breath in her throat hitching beneath his lips as she reached for air, chest heaving with a startled, dazedly blissful effort to calm herself. One of his hands twisted through the soft, dark strands of her hair, cupping the nape of her neck within a protective cradle. The other slid under the hem of her slipping woolen cover to trail down her graceful back. Complete physical impulse, tender, gentle and unintentionally provocative.

Lilith's harried breath stilled when she felt the blanket slip from her torso to catch between their hips, exposing more flesh than she had shown to anyone. _Naked_ in the same room with him – so close!

Her nerves couldn't have been shrieking any louder, internal fears screaming as loud as they had ever done before, urgency driven by the danger of being trapped with nowhere to run. The impulse to curl up into a ball and not move until he had gone was powerful, and yet at first she was completely motionless, frozen like a startled deer, not knowing what to do.

Reflex drove her feeble grab for the fabric, fright guiding her like a shock of prey-driven alarm, but he caught her hands in his, preventing her from snatching up the shield.

She tugged at his grip, not caring that her strength was a mere sliver of his own, determined not to…to_ what?_ Let him see her in such a vulnerable state? She didn't know. She was truly confused, uncertain as to where she should turn for safety, faltering against the instinctual need to hide and protect herself from something that, when she paused to think, didn't feel evil at all.

"Lilith," his voice was husky, rougher and pitched more deeply than usual when he spoke against her cheek, the tone sending a dazzling shiver down her spine. "I swore to you that I would never harm you, and I intend to keep that promise."

For a moment he was quiet, then he was asking gently, "do you want me to stop?"

Her immediate, gut reaction to this question was one of terror. She didn't want him to go. She didn't want him out of her sight ever again! She had lost him once – never, _ever_ again. What followed, however, was the dark shadow of doubt.

Was she prepared to take such a step? Would she be able to silence that part of herself that still feared the idea of opening herself up to a man? This was one thing that hadn't been taken from her, and it was precious, but there were things more precious still that she hadn't recognized until the night before. She trusted her life to him without question, was this so different? She loved him, and he had done so much for her…wasn't it about time she returned the favor?

Slowly, tentatively, Lilith reached out and laid her palms against the hard, smooth planes of his stomach. Her exploration was shy, the barest, skimming touch to his powerful abdomen, gathering her courage to let her fingers trail over his hips and down his lower back, then still lower to slip over firm buttocks.

Azrael inhaled sharply, his entire body stiffening beneath her fingers. He retreated, drawing back to look her directly in the eyes. There was something desperate behind those lovely eyes, in his face, something that greatly resembled a plea.

"Please," he implored, "don't do things like that, unless—"

She put a finger to his lips, stilling his protests as he had done to her, and murmured, "I'm not afraid anymore." Amazed by her own reckless gall, she leaned timidly forward to brush a kiss against his chest, lips caressing the pale flesh directly over the place where his tender, mortal heart beat.

With one of his long, elegant hands he cupped her chin, strong fingers bringing her to eyes back to his. "Are you asking me to…" The question faded before it had the chance to approach a resolution, the words dying upon his tongue, hardly daring to believe, not daring to hope that he had heard correctly.

"M-make love to me," she finished for him, her cheeks burning with a charming, rose-tinted blush as she said it, her voice a mousy murmur of shyness and trembling, curiosity. "Yes."

Violet eyes flashed pale with shock, narrowing just slightly as they studied her closely, meticulously, as though to pierce her through, reach into her and pull out the truth. This _couldn't_ be real. He had to be dreaming, it was the only explanation.

And yet, not even the most vivid and graphic of his dreams had drawn such a desperate, searing ache.

For a fleeting instant he wondered whether he had misplaced some part of his own senses whilst in the healing state of oblivion. Perhaps he had left some trace of consciousness behind in Eden in his haste to answer her call? It would have explained the delusions, but it was also impossible. Raphael had bid him well as he departed from the healing gardens, and Raphael never made mistakes as to the health or wholeness of anyone.

This was real. His timid, male-deterrent ward was truly asking him to cross that line she had charred into the ground between them. Yet however absurd it may have seemed, there was no chance of mistaking the sweet, endearing flush of color dusted across her skin. So much beautiful skin…

He reached with hands that were of magic, not flesh. His inhuman talent for interpreting emotion scanned her aura, sensing curiosity, affection and stubborn, blatant tenacity. And there was something else, something just beneath the sweet scent of her breath, something that could not lie. The scent of raw, physical _desire._

She _wanted_ him, and by the soft, warm gleam in the green of her eyes, she knew and savored it.

The depthless rings of his irises flashed with the darkest violet, a color that swirled with the blue of a winter dusk. He didn't ask if she was sure. He didn't need to, for the answer was displayed clear on her face. He could read it in the shy yet determined tilt of her chin, the focus in her eyes, and the firm set of her soft mouth.

She was trusting him with something that she treasured, something precious and delicate, trusting him to tread gently. Her trust meant everything to him, all the knowledge and experience in the world was worth nothing compared to the faith she was showing him now. And come Hell or high water, he would make sure that she received nothing but the utmost pleasure, protection and care as her reward for that trust.

For the first time that evening he fully relaxed, the hard, strict control that had ruled his frame softening in time to the steady throb of his heart.

He carried her hand to his mouth, brushing a feather-fine kiss to her fingers – everything soft and warm and doting, the ideal specimen of gentility and tenderness for the woman he adored. "As you wish, my love."

Fathomless eyes flickered closed and his grip shifted so that the pale underside of her arm was turned up to the ceiling. With a soothing brush of breath to her open palm he spoke a quick, silent prayer and his marble lips lowered to touch the delicate inside of her wrist.

Lilith squirmed with hastily suppressed delight as Azrael's lips and tongue traveled along the length of her arm. He was painfully slow, taking long, lingering minutes to trace the lines of her palm and the faint trails of the veins visible beneath her pale skin, soft strokes of burning, wine-soaked velvet. Every miniscule touch sent a luscious tingling throughout her body, coaxing hot, rippling shivers to creep up and down her spine.

It was almost enough to drive her into madness, a relish that bordered on discomfort, heat and pleasure a rich, sugary ache imprinted into every fiber of her being.

She didn't know what was wrong with her. Or why her body itched all over, why the restlessness kept whispering wicked, unholy things into her ears. She couldn't understand the sudden appeal of things that had always seemed so dirty and depraved before, but she knew it was his fault.

Her eyes settled on him, the lovely head bent over her forearm, pale hair spilling forward to veil his handsome face. She swallowed; her mouth suddenly dry as she followed the sleek, sloping muscles of his arms with her gaze, trailing up the shoulders that were sturdy and broad, down to fix to the smooth planes of his chest.

She lingered there for a long, yearning moment, her insides coiling and recoiling with a sensation not unlike the feeling of hunger, stomach writhing with some distressed twist of pleading want. Beauty was not purely a word for womankind, no indeed. If man found the breasts of a woman to be appealing, it was surely no different than the appeal he had for her. The sculpted curvature of the angel's torso made her mouth water.

His sides and stomach were trim with strength without the bulk of excessive muscle. He had no need to be the model of pure brawn, as he had proven when pitted against a male far brawnier than he. His hips were also slim, prominent ridges against the carven smoothness of his abdomen and sloping into firm, powerful thighs…

She squeaked, her concentration shattered when the warm length of his tongue tracing the shell of her ear, knowing instantly that she had been caught staring.

"This is not the place for such things," he murmured. A heated, sensual purr edged his voice, which had deepened in tone to the sultry roll of muted thunder. The breathy, husky quality to the sound was a subtle form of compulsion, enthralling and beckoning, his words like a song promising decadence beyond mortal imagination.

He took gentle hold of her elbows and coaxed her toward the door that led back to the bedroom, his grip as much of a support as it was a touch designed to lure her into following him.

As soon as he stepped away, the blanket slid down her legs to pool on the tiled floor about their feet, lying in abandoned symbolism as the last of her willing shields against him. Bare skin met bare skin, Azrael's soft ivory against Lilith's creamy pallor, and she could feel the heat that had flared across his usually so cool skin. Like tinder to spark she could feel her flesh start to burn. Immediately her body strayed toward him, itching to retain contact because somehow she knew that it was the only way to quiet the aching in her bones.

Her knees shook, weakened beneath her own appalling need and instinctively she slung her arms around his neck, pressing her mouth to his. So desperate was she for his touch that she no longer cared how atrocious the action might have seemed.

She didn't care what anyone thought. She couldn't understand what she wanted or why she wanted it – whatever it was, she _had_ to have it. She would die; simply dissolve into ashes without it.

Responding instantly to her demand, his arms slipped around her waist, looping underneath the curve of her bottom to keep her tight to his body while he blindly felt his way across the room. Who needed to see? He knew her bedroom as well as he knew his own. How he wished he could take her there, wrap her in _his_ sheets and brand her as _his _and his _alone._ But no matter, this would do nicely.

The backs of Lilith's knees hit the edge of her bed, soft covers gentling the impact. Trembling and weak, they finally gave out, unable to support her own weight any longer, and she fell backward, dragging him down with her. The hard weight of him blanketed her like a living cage of satin skin and firm, lean muscle, considerate enough to keep from crushing her but unwilling to stray too far away. A cage of love and tender devotion, and one that she had no wish to escape from.

Easing his mouth from her rosy, swollen lips to let her breathe, he brushed a fleeting kiss to the line of her jaw, allowing himself the joyful freedom of exploration.

Knowing and delighting in the sensitive flutter of delighted nerves and the trill of her pulse, he paid faithful tribute to the tender column of her throat. He blessed one of her shoulders with a whisper of praise. His hands slid along her sides, following her ribs and the taper of her waist with reverential caresses, palms smoothing over soft skin to trace the flare of her hips.

His breath whisked against her sternum, sweet and warm as he nuzzled her collarbone, and then, after a brief pause, bent his head to touch a delicate kiss to the curve of one of her breasts.

She stiffened, her back arching automatically to press against him, closer to the aphrodisiac of his touch her lips parting in a soft O as a breathless, awe-stricken sound broke free from her throat. It was as though she had been starved all her life. As though everything else he had shown her before had been mere child's play compared with the terrible, ravenous craving that rippled through her insides like a seizure.

She felt feeble and powerless, at his mercy to do with as he pleased. Yet in the very same instant she felt like the strongest person alive, filled with feeling and knowledge that was both everything and nothing at all.

A searing rush of unbelievable desire flooded her, sparking a steady, throbbing ache between her legs. It hurt so badly that it was wonderful; sweet, burning, festering pain that was atrociously delicious. She just wanted to touch him, smother herself in the spicy scent of him and the sleek, sophisticated feel of his body. So she let her hands slip over his shoulders to smooth across the powerful muscles of his back, reveling in the responsive ripple of strength beneath the smooth skin.

There were no marks to recall that his wings had been torn out of his shoulder blades. There was nothing but the slight grooves of his tattoo, the mark of those peerless, feathered appendages when concealed from their true form. The texture of the scrawling designs was comforting to the touch, serving as further insurance that he was perfectly unharmed from his earlier encounter with a fist of judgment.

One broad hand slowly traced the dip of her waist, tracing delicate patterns with the tips of his fingers before gently cupping the soft swell of her breast with a warm palm. "_Ihivah_…" he breathed, "so beautiful."

He inhaled, taking in the light, captivatingly familiar floral smell of her mixed with the tantalizing scent of sweat. Sight, sound, scent, touch…it wasn't enough, he wanted more.

His mouth dragged against her skin, the tip of his tongue a soft caress to the curved slope of flesh within reach, and he bit back the temptation to unleash a rather wolfish growl of pleasure as he drew back, licking his lips. Satisfaction didn't cover the sensation of having all five senses appeased, and delicious didn't even _begin_ to describe the taste that now haunted him, all sweetness and a sharp hint of spice.

He lowered his head again, determined not to let the fleeting flavor become a scar; drunk upon touching her, perfectly content with committing every smooth inch of her lovely breasts to memory with fingers, lips and tongue.

Lilith's breath quickened, her hands falling uselessly to the mattress, stunned by the touches that made her insides writhe and twist with pleasure. She fought to think, to pull herself from the rush of utter sensitivity, unsure of how to handle the restless longing in her body and her brain.

It was such a private place that he touched, enough that the knowledge of it brought her a blush. Yet the touch didn't feel at all like she had expected. It wasn't like the harsh groping she had experienced before; it wasn't even uncomfortable, but loving and considerate, slow and teasing. The lush, gentle strokes of his mouth and tongue were so openly and sensually erotic that heat seemed to pour into her veins until she thought she would either simply faint or burst into flames.

Despite the newness and the small sparks of uncertainty, she found she hadn't the heart to lie to herself about how much she wanted to give in to that sweet compulsion.

A hushed, mewling sigh slid unbidden from between her lips. Her bright eyes fluttered closed and her head tipped back, mindless in her surrender, dark hair spilling across the pillows and her fingers curling into the sheet spread beneath her.

Every touch, every move he made was meant to please her. That much was obvious even to her admittedly sparse understanding of the mechanics. Azrael knew _exactly_ what he was doing; she had no doubt about that. He seemed to have no difficulty finding those slight, delicate little touches that brought a steady trembling deep from her bones.

His heat seemed to sink into her, surround her, draw an answering flush that spread across her bare body. It was intoxicating, the nearness and the gentle pressure of his weight. His pale hair brushed her skin, matching the soft touch of his mouth and the gentle grip of his hands. The impulse struck her hard enough to drive all else from her mind.

She had to _touch_ him.

She lifted her hands to comb slender fingers through the loose spill of his pale hair. Softly she traced down his temples and sharp, high cheekbones, tucking under his smooth chin to pull his mouth back up to hers. He acquiesced without complaint, compliantly adjusting to better-suit her request for a kiss, and she let her fingers trail along his throat to touch his Adam's apple. Curving with the build of his chest, her palms edged slowly lower, as though she could absorb the feel of every firm muscle with every inch she gained.

A thick shudder coursed its way down his body and he sucked in a deep breath, shoulders straining when her fingernails gently grazed his skin, trailing lower still to follow the hard plains of his stomach.

She drew a sensual, explorative circle where the navel would have been had her partner been human. She hadn't noticed its absence before, but the lack of it made a certain sense, especially when there was only so much attention she could turn to it. Then, after a slight pause ripe with trepidation, her fingers slid just a few inches lower to softly stroke the flesh of his inner thighs.

Sound pierced her consciousness when his throat retracted with the sharp jerk of a gasp. She pulled back, rendered skittish by the reaction, and her hands brushed the juncture of his thighs as she moved to grip his waist. To her shock, his harsh breath melted into a throaty moan of pleasure. The heavy lilt of his voice poured between her parted lips. When he pulled away from her sweet, pliant mouth, she realized how heavily he was breathing, as though he _needed_ to breathe now, immortal or no.

He tipped back his white-blond head, brow glistening with a thin sheen of sweat, and whispered, rough and low, "Do you know what you _do_ to me?"

A flower of heat flushed her cheeks, born from shyness and a shallow embarrassment that she ordered herself to ignore.

The light in his eyes told her quite clearly that he wouldn't take another step until she expressly allowed it. She was utterly exposed, within reach, free for the taking, yet there he was, asking her permission before going an inch farther; taking the time to cater to her comfort as though he were still courting a nervous child. What an example of willpower.

How many times had he urged her to be careful? How many times had he warned her that exposure would make him snap and hurt her? Somehow she had always known those warnings had been overly dramatic, and the confirmation of it drew her that much closer to him.

She had changed because of him, because of his patience and persistence, the care and effort he had invested into making her feel safe within his presence. The schoolgirl-worthy crush she had first held for him, that simple, timid admiration of a dazzled human girl, had grown without her knowing until it had bloomed like a flower, binding her resolutely to him. He was more than just her guardian angel. He had seen her at her weakest and stood by her regardless of it. He had shown her how to be strong.

Perhaps she hadn't believed in love when they had officially met, but she certainly believed in it now.

With a small jolt of bashful bemusement, she wondered what might happen should anyone walk in on them, not that she expected it. There was no way he would be letting anyone anywhere near her until they finished what he had started and she adamantly hoped it stayed that way, because an interruption would not be welcomed. Not this time.

Her hands slid back up the length of his body, curving gently with the powerful figure poised above her like a shield of fair white flesh, and loosely circled her arms around his neck, filling her fingers with soft, feather-streaked hair. Lifting her head from the mattress, her green eyes averted shyly from his face before flickering closed; both to hide and to prove to him just how safe she truly felt held there with her skin to his.

Her dark head tilted just slightly to one side, the end of her nose brushing a soft, hair-thin line down his half-hollowed cheek. Then she opened her mouth and let the tip of her tongue glide across his lower lip.

Stunned, Azrael's eyes widened, taken-aback by the seductive provocation of the action, and all the things it stood for. Though she had done it to show him that she was brave, that she was comfortable, the aversion of her eyes he could recognize as a sign of mild nerves, but also of submission. Part of her instinctively knew how to tell him that she accepted his dominance, that she trusted him, and that she was willing.

He knew perfectly well how much she had feared such intimacy, had been with her, standing in the shadows as she developed that fear, and while he had hoped that he could one day entice her into abandoning them, those hopes had only ever been halfhearted.

Yet she was clearly setting aside her own shields of safety, not because she felt obligated, as if in payment for the years of guardianship, but because she wanted to. Offering herself up like some selfless virgin maid in a pagan story to comfort and heal the lonely, suffering immortal that looked on humanity with envy boiling in his veins. It pulled at him like fingers wrapped tight around his tender heartstrings.

He would do anything that she asked of him. Any word, any slight request, any whisper of a wish and he would obey.

After countless centuries of being the angel who could not be tamed, tempted or swayed, there was a collar around his neck; a gilded, emerald collar that he bore with pride. And the leash attached to that collar resting in her delicate little hands. He would answer any plea she voiced to him, would wag his proverbial tail for no other woman on the face of the earth. There was no other way to put it; he was a slave, shackled by his own conscious will.

He leant closer to crush himself against the jarring, liquid agony of her soft flesh, and spoke with a husky, longing-roughened tone – seeking a command, something to tell him how to pay proper tribute to this precious creature he so adored.

"Tell me what you want," he pleaded, half ordering and half begging for an answer, bringing a tingling shiver to her spine with the deeper, heavier element to his gifted voice. "Anything and it's yours."

It was ridiculously difficult to catch her breath back, the press of him against her own sensitive skin like a constant grind to her sanity, fighting the urge to drop into a swoon with every ounce of strength she could muster. She drew a shuddering breath, gathering the courage she needed to respond with what her body and her heart were screaming for her to tell him. Her lips smoothed against his as she whispered, "all I want is you."

"As you wish," he replied, almost silently, the words mere movement against her skin. He kissed her thoroughly, his left arm snaking around her to prop against the mattress, smoothing back her soft, dark hair with pale fingers.

The angel's warm, capable mouth brushed the edge of her jaw, touching satin-soft kisses to her skin. With the same breath, his right hand slipped down the side of her neck, smoothed along the valley between her breasts, fingers dragging down across her belly. A lover's caress.

There was no lingering edge of paternal feeling left to him. It had been burned away by seemingly endless hours of obsessive, ravenous passions that had kept him awake night after night as he tossed and turned, tearing at bed-sheets and clothing until only shreds of cloth remained. A raging animal caged within his own dangerous hallucinations, fatherly feeling morbidly warped into a rabid desire forbidden by all the laws and rights he knew.

How many days had he lost – how many sleepless nights, every scattered dream he managed to have filled with her? How long had he yearned to show himself, to grab her as she passed him on her way to class, to work, and pin her to the nearest wall to flush out the fever-like need to feel her soft, naked skin? How long had he waited for this?

And how close had he come to losing her?

Images of clawed, filthy hands circling his beloved's delicate throat flared unbidden into his mind, terrible and clear. The memory of the vicious, vengeful kiss that the demon overseer had forced upon his ward while he could do nothing but watch, absolutely helpless, sparked the barest flicker of anger.

That would _not_ happen again. Not so long as he had some sort of body with which to draw breath. He would never put her in such danger a second time.

Molding anger into resolve, he called a tiny thread of his power from the well of magical energy set deep inside him, calling it to his hand. Sending the sliver of violet fire into his palm, he let it stream through his own skin and directly into hers. With the sheer force of his will behind him, he strengthened the meager tracking spells, adding to them ones of ownership and marking, and with a gentle locking of mental gears the spell connected.

Everywhere he touched, every stroke of his fingertips and brush of his lips, would bind her to him. It would become an invisible brand of possession and protection, a warning to every immortal who might happen upon her to keep their hands to themselves. She belonged to _him. _And now, not even blood would be able to hide her from him.

Now, he could attune his focus to the pure pleasure of touching her.

His fingers curled with the shape of her stomach, palm stroking downward across the bare, sensitive flesh of her exposed belly. A luscious, liquid shiver rippled through her body under his touch, her hands kneading dazedly against his shoulders as she made another of those sweet, desperate little keening noises. Instinctual feminine urgency, blind, pleading, and telling him everything he needed to know without even realizing she had sent him a message at all.

His lips pressed to the hollow of her throat, fingers following the curve of her abdomen to slip between her thighs.

Muscle tightened, nerves flaming, heart leaping into a rapid burst of frenzied beating and her throat constricted against his mouth, swallowing an audible sound. Her fingernails scraped against the flesh of his back, with shock and with elation, yet he barely felt it. The pain was a pleasant one and he relished it, glowing with the power he held over her.

Lilith choked back another cry as his fingers shifted against a place so secret and personal that it was a wonder she even understood it at all. The touch was gentle, soft, bringing her an ache composed of raw, blinding pleasure to twist her mindless. But the throb of it made her feel as though she was about to burst like an overripe plum, too-thin skin on the brink of splitting under awful, delicious torture.

She was just barely capable of remembering that she was in an apartment complex, with a bedroom wall thin enough to allow her neighbor to hear any loud noises, and clamped her mouth shut to keep quiet. There was naught but a strangled whimper to give any indication she still had a voice at all.

"Scream as loud as you need to, sweetling," he cooed as if he could read her mind, lips and tongue smoothing over the delicate contours of her pale neck. "I've soundproofed the room."

Half-deafened to his words, she tossed her head to the side, groping for the edge of a pillow to muffle the sound she _had_ to let out. His free hand – forearm still bracing against the mattress – grabbed her, pinning her hand to the bed, fingers entwining with hers. "I want to hear your voice…" he whispered, and his other hand shifted.

A startled cry tore from her mouth, shattering the quiet, spiraling into a sigh of mystified rapture as he found the perfect angle, a place she hadn't even known existed until that moment.

She squirmed, writhing in pleasure and desperation against his touch, slender back arching almost to bring her from the mattress and pressed herself against the cage offering such delectable promises.

Color and light sparked at the corners of her vision, her eyes glazed and her tongue sliding over her swollen lips as though trying to find some trace of his taste there. A slave to physical feeling, her small body trembled beneath his command, against every moral she had ever believed in. She reveled in his control, bathing in his manipulation with an innocent rapture.

The murmur was weak for her ragged breath but he felt it in the back of her throat, praise and plea wrapped with a ribbon of complete and utter yearning. "Azrael—"

His lips at her ear, a gentle whisper, "say it again." The touch of his hand brushed her stomach once more. Why was he moving away? He couldn't stop now, not now that it hurt so wonderfully. "My name. Say it again."

"Azrael," she breathed, her fingers tangling in his pale hair as she tried to pull him closer, hoping that maybe if she begged he might somehow be able to put her out of her miserable delirium. "Please, _Azrael_—I need…"

Her skin burned with a slow, liquid fire when his agile hand slid along the length of her thigh, coaxing until his hips were cradled between her legs, adjusting his weight just before he closed the space between them with the slide of a key to its lock.

The first reaction was a muted noise of discomfort while something inside her was compressed, as though a great, numbing weight was being pressed in upon it. Then it was pain, piercing her swift and hard, stinging her eyes with tears and dulling every tender feeling under a sudden rush of fright.

What was this, and why was he _hurting_ her? In all the time she had known him, never once had he ever harmed her, not a single hair on her head. And now it seemed almost like he was intending to, a harsh, nearly bone-numbing crush of pain accompanying the thrust of his movement. A whimper quivered at her lips. She wanted to shrink away from him, to make the hurting stop, but he kissed her gently, murmuring that the pain would be only temporary.

The sweetness of his mouth against her cheeks smoothed the tears away, pressed against her lips to swallow the hurt for her. "Just hold on to me," he bid her, holding her against his stronger body to give shelter and solace. And, as usual, he was right.

Virtual seconds later, floating on the wake of a shivering inhale, an almost literal wave of the most euphoric sensation she had ever known engulfed her.

It was like drowning in chocolate, like being smothered in silk and sunlight, like being impaled upon everything that was wonderful, beautiful bodily paradise. Lilith's arms wrapped tightly around Azrael's neck, her nails digging into the taut, sweat-dampened muscles of his shoulders and back, legs hugging tight about his hips without any intention of letting him go. How she possibly could have doubted him, she might never again understand.

And God…_this_ was what she had been missing?

She finally did swoon, her head falling back to the pillow, her breath harsh and quick, overwhelmed with spasms of ecstasy.

One of Azrael's arms had circled her waist, pressing her body closer to his own and allowing no space to come between them, hard, trained male muscle cushioning soft, curved female flesh. His other hand had risen to cradle her neck.

His thumb stroked the tender little spot just between jaw line and earlobe, his face buried in the soft strands of her hair at her neck, small, quiet sounds slipping from his throat. The soft pressure of her body slid against him, her hands on his skin and in his hair, the addictive, flowery scent of her soaking his senses, smothering him in heavenly intoxication.

None of the most powerful words in the most beautiful languages he knew would ever be able to imitate or describe such a feeling. Nothing in the world could ever hope to match this. He was finally – _finally_ – home, at last.

Their lovemaking was slow and passionate; composed of gentle touches, deep, searing kisses, breathy gasps and moans of delight to whisk away the pain and loss and sorrow. When Azrael dropped beside her on the bed, boneless and streaked with their sweat, Lilith lay still, her eyes closed, and a faint, dazed smile curving her pink, swollen lips. Warm and lethargic, every nerve tingling, she felt whole, complete and safe in a way that she had never really imagined was possible.

For the first time in her life she felt completely at peace. How ironic that such contentment had come from such a thorough ravishing, something she once thought she would rather die than experience.

Her green eyes fluttered open when his arm slipped around her waist, a silent assurance of doting protection, and she smiled rather dazedly up at him. _His_ eyes bright and vivid violet, full with a life and joy she didn't think she had ever seen in them before, truly, deeply touched by her consent to show her the true power of physical love.

"How do you feel?" he asked, brushing a few stray strands of hair back from her forehead.

Lilith answered with another smile and a tired, but thoroughly contented sigh. "_Wonderful._" She reached up and stroked his cheek with an affectionate finger, and then paused, a gnawing sense of dread creeping across her mind. Wasn't intimacy forbidden by divine law? Had she just sentenced him to fall – for real, this time? "But Azrael, maybe we shouldn't have—"

Amusement was in his eyes. He bent and kissed her forehead before settling down beside her, gently enfolding her within his arms and tucking her back against his chest. "If it is a sin to love you as I do, then may I be forever damned," he murmured, his voice soothing and melodic with the lilt of a lullaby.

He must have sensed that the sentiment did little to soothe her worries, for he laughed gently and added, "Don't worry your lovely head about me, Sweetling. I promise you, we did nothing wrong. Now sleep," his lips brushed her cheek. "Sleep…"

And sleep she did, deeply, unbroken, and long, comforted by his touch, his breath, and his steady warmth. Sleep had never come so easy. Not since she had been old enough to understand all that there was to fear in the world. Pain and sorrow were long gone now, countered by the familiar, guarding presence that had eluded her throughout the past night.

Azrael lay awake for some time after Lilith's breath had slowed to the rhythmic pattern of slumber, his heart – the self-same heart he had scorned and despaired of – beating with a quiet contentment.

He understood now, why he had been made as he had, reliant on something as volatile as love. He understood why it had taken so long to find someone who would to balance the cold and isolation of his purpose.

Her presence amid his gloomy comings and goings had shone a bright light upon his spirit, bringing him back to a place where he remembered the good of his work. She had made him feel as though he had a purpose that was more than a depressing chore, more than mere existence, that there was more to him than the blackness gradually devouring his soul.

He looked down at her, nestled in his arms, relaxed and trusting, violet gaze tender and skin glowing white with the luminance of happiness. She was so young, so warm, so real; all he could ever have wished for and more. He couldn't have hoped to deserve her, and yet he found that he no longer cared what he deserved or didn't, nor how many dark things littered his past. She was the only thing that mattered now, her and his unending debt of gratitude to her courage and kindness.

For it was she and nothing else that had reminded him what it felt to be truly _alive_.


	32. Something Like Home

**Chapter 31  
**Something Like Home

Recommended Listening: "Naked" by Avril Lavigne and  
"Wrapped in your Arms" by Fireflight

* * *

For the first time in her life she woke to find that she wasn't alone, and her immediate thoughts were not of the newness or strangeness, but of how very happy she was.

It was a peculiar thing; the automatic, almost magnetic curve of her body into the one that lay beside her. The gentle weight and warmth of the protective arm curled loose around her waist drew her focus to the soft brush of another consciousness occupying the same space as she, and to the strands of foreign hair at the back of her neck. But despite the peculiarity, it was distinctly pleasant.

Every inch of tension had been leeched from her system, leaving nothing but loose, lazy contentedness, wanting nothing more than a continuation of the happy, sunshine-and-apricot delirium. She likened it to a list of moments and feelings all rolled into one monogamous mesh; a hot bubble bath, curling up with a good book on a quiet afternoon, coffee with biscotti, everything that was warm and wonderful to wrap her up in a nest of bliss.

Perhaps it was because she had felt so lonely for so long, and the recognition of a partner who hadn't abandoned her had settled something inside her, or perhaps it was merely because she had secretly longed for someone to show her such devotion. Perhaps she felt that her lover had passed his final test. A test determined by whether or not she found him in her bed the moment her eyes opened and she turned her head to look at him, as she did then.

In sleep he seemed so innocent.

He looked as peaceful and relaxed as a child, his face calm, serene and somehow much softer than when he was awake. Golden, feathered hair was wild in disarray, a pale halo fanned across the pillow; his eyelashes formed a dark, lace-like pattern across his high marble cheekbones. And he was utterly still, lacking the conscious effort he usually put into breathing.

She had never seen him look so incredibly human. Not even when he had been impaled through the chest and bled out before her eyes. But even in this tranquil, untroubled stillness, she could feel the divine energy within him, pulsing and vibrant; an ageless perfection which housed one of the greatest flaws of his entire race. For he was the black sheep of the heavens, the angel who had turned up his nose to angelic celibacy for nothing more than the simple pleasure of touching her cheek or burying his face in her hair.

It seemed strange to her, that something so brazen and primitive could have had such a strong impact on him. He truly looked happier, even in slumber; the invisible aura around him seemed to encompass more stability than it ever had in her presence. Maybe that was a sign that she had passed _his_ test.

Whatever the cause, the soft, gentle quiet which greeted her sleepily blinking eyes was lovely. Everything around her felt right and good, at a kind of peace, like nothing could ever harm her or her loved ones ever again.

It gave her a sense of boundless safety to be wrapped there in comfort and security that could counter all the little bits of nastiness sneaking around out there beyond the covers. Though she knew this was far from how the world worked, it was still a sweet dream.

Lilith allowed herself a quiet, dreamy sigh and tucked her face back into the pillow, thinking that she really should get up. She was one of those people that got up when they woke, just because it seemed logical. In truth she didn't want to move just yet, but as much as she wanted to just lay there in a candy-coated lethargy, curled into the angel's warm body, it just wouldn't do.

Another regretful sigh lifted from her lips as she shifted to rise and slowly, carefully slipped from Azrael's sleep-weighted grasp, hoping she could avoid waking him, still oblivious to the world. It was a bit of a challenge, but she managed to slide out from under his arm without too much jostling.

She winced as she straightened, touching a hand to her abdomen, over the soft ache that strained muscles she couldn't ever remember having strained. As a matter of fact, she didn't think she had known of their existed. The smile came unbidden, born from the giddiness which bubbled like a fizzy liquid inside her veins as though it had somehow replaced her blood. As strange as it might have sounded, she was rather proud of the tiny touch of pain, considering what had caused it, the cage she had broken free from to help put it there.

She wouldn't have been able to explain it, but something about the awareness of those muscles she had been born with had changed overnight. Though she had been cursed to bleed, had been made useless and unproductive with cramps, and had loathed the organ for its purpose, she suddenly she felt almost fond of the uterus that had been the bane of her existence once every month. She had earned this particular, impermanent battle-scar.

She headed for the closet, shivering under the chill of the air outside the heat-soaked bed, and pulled open the door and reach for the first nightgown she saw. Feeling lightheaded and contently cheerful, she tugged the flowy cotton garment over her head and let it drop to rest against her calves.

Dressing offered her a small relief, though in some ways it felt restrictive and cowardly. Casual nudity had never been in her repertoire of practices, it was embarrassing to think about, let alone to actually do. And yet when she smoothed her hands down the soft front of the dress, she wondered why she cared so much.

"What are you doing?"

Lilith jumped, quiet efficiently startled half out of her wits, and pressed a hand to her chest over the mad fluttering of her heart. Fighting the urge to giggle with a mild, sweet kind of hysteria, she turned to peer over her shoulder at the other occupant of the room.

The angel had propped himself up on his elbows, the blankets sliding from his shoulders as he sat up to watch her with eyes colored a warm, dusky blue-violet, liquid and deep with an effervescent intensity that should have been impossible. Of course he had woken. Alertly and keenly attuned to everything around him, senses generously sharper then those of a human man Azrael noticed everything. Her abandonment of the bed must have pulled him from slumber's velvet grasp.

Now, he was watching her, following the movement of her arm when she fished in another drawer for a pair of underwear, expression calm and still slightly hazy with sleep, observing the pale blue garment she had donned with just the mildest touch of displeasure.

"Why the gown?" he asked softly, and there was a muted edge to his voice, rich and low with remnants of something other than mere question.

When she looked more closely, she could still discern the bright, enlivened glow within his gaze reminiscent of the one which had so consumed him when she had consented to give him the one thing she had sworn never to share with any man. When she had completely surrendered body, mind, and soul to him.

She felt her cheeks grow warm as the blunt reality of what she had done hit her full force in the gut.

Memory unfurled inside her mind, sending her vivid, detailed echoes sharper, clearer and brighter than before, the tastes and scents and textures instantly recalled as though they had been imprinted into her skin. She remembered every touch, every caress, every breathy sound that had slipped from her mouth, every arch and press of her traitorous body.

How long had she kept her distance from men – from him – and for what? She had broken down and _begged,_ blinded and overwhelmed, without even a sliver of self control. When had she become such a wanton?

Turning away to ease the weight of his gaze, she pulled on the clean underwear, somehow managing not to flash too much of the skin above her knees. "Because," she replied, short and cutting with embarrassment.

She didn't need to see him to know when he stood. She could _feel_ him rise from the bed, feel the blankets slide regretfully from his body, as though the bedding itself was loath to see him go. Completely at ease – or perhaps just lacking care – with his nakedness, he moved like some great, graceful animal, feet padding softly against the carpeted floor as he approached to take her by the waist.

His hands were gentle and still, lips smooth and tender when they brushed against the curve of her neck. "A little late for modesty, isn't it, love?"

Warm breath whisked against her skin, sending heat curling deep and deliberate in the pit of her stomach, and she quickly suppressed a shiver, carefully arranging her expression to one of blank indifference. She would not allow this teasing to get the better of her. Propriety, after all…

Apparently he didn't agree with her decision, not that she was surprised. One strong hand slid downward to her skirt hem, a light, skimming touch to her thigh which dragged very slowly up along the outside length, gathering fabric as he went. Slowed and somewhat dazed by lethargy, she didn't realize just what was going on until his fingertips made contact with her naked skin, nails grazing ever so gently against the slope of her leg.

Such a delicate touch, yet it caused such a violent reaction that her brain simply didn't know what to make of it. Her body, however, _did._

All of a sudden, she was boneless and liquid, instinctively softening beneath the tingle of energy that did the cruelest things to her insides. She lifted hands that seemed heavy and insubstantial to the firm plane of his stomach, touching in part to keep from falling over. Her knee bent, coaxed and lulled with the slide of his palm to guide her into smoothly letting it curve until he was half-tucked between the slight part of her thighs.

"_Oh…_"

Languid and crafty, he acknowledged the sound that snuck from her unguarded throat, tracing the line of her jugular with his lips to reach the sensitive little spot just below the ear.

She burned. Fire seemed to spill from her skin, rapid, consuming, so wonderfully near to point of pain. White teeth nipped at her earlobe, drawing it between marble lips to tease with a wicked tongue. She trembled under the convulsion of a shiver, arching her body into the powerful curvature of his torso, pleasure sparking like electricity wherever she came into contact with his flesh.

Oh yes…_this_ was why she had done it. How could something so base and simplistic feel so incredibly _good?_

Tinny, frantic ringing was what broke her from the clutches of persistent, sensual promise. She turned her head, thoughts scattered, as the phone rang loudly and irritably from the kitchen.

"Ignore it," Azrael murmured simply, twining a lock of her hair between his long, pale fingers, the gesture quite purposefully alluring and breathtakingly suggestive. The other hand softly stroked the skin just above the back of her knee and she could have sworn her heart might have imploded. "Just this once."

But she took a deep, shuddering breath, steeled her nerves, and pulled away, heading for the door that led to the kitchen. The curtains were still drawn over the windows, but slivers of soft wintry morning light peeked in through the cracks between fabric and wall, so ironically different from the dark, brooding night that had preceded it that it was almost as if the sky were determined to reflect her mood.

A glance toward the clock over at the far wall, somewhat shocked to read that it was a little past one o'clock in the afternoon. Her eyes widened, disbelieving. What day was it? How long had they been sleeping? She no longer knew, and part of her fretted about missing work or class – that part of her which wasn't dazed by the magnetic pull of the man who had become her lover.

Quickly pushing that thought to the deepest corner of her mind, she snatched the phone from its cradle and held it up to her ear. "Hello?" she greeted neutrally, her voice lined with just the barest hint of a tremor.

"Lilith?" It was a man's voice, one she hadn't heard for a long time but knew very well.

"Uncle Dan?" she cried, almost not believing she had heard properly. The bright smile came unbidden, free and warm with delight, and she leaned forward to brace her arms against the surface of the counter, phone held secure to her ear. "I haven't heard from you in _ages!_ How are things?"

Daniel Everett, her father's older brother, had moved to Europe to study biochemistry not long after her sixth birthday, having never been close to his sibling or sister-in-law. He was one of her only living relatives, at least the ones that she acknowledged and cared about. And he was by far one of her favorite people.

Unlike his brother, Daniel had never married and had no children, though Lilith had always thought that he would make an amazing father. He was calm of temper, kindly, good-humored, and he worried like an old mother hen. But he had forgone relationships, choosing instead to pursue his career as a military scientist and to dote shamelessly upon his only niece from halfway across the globe.

The only reason she could afford her dance classes was because of her uncle's insistence that he wire her money every month, his way of contributing to his family, or so he claimed. But she knew he felt awful for having left her with his brother.

No matter how many times she reminded him that that he wasn't at fault or obligation, that he hadn't known of Joseph's tendency to raise his hand to his wife and daughter until the legal documents explaining her suit for emancipation had been sent to him for a signature, her arguments went ignored. Daniel could be fantastically stern when he chose to be, and he refused to accept her excuses for not accepting his money, which made her feel even guiltier when she didn't spend it as he wanted her to.

So she had resigned herself to the help. And, eventually, she found acceptance in the fact that she was lucky to have someone who cared enough to want to help her. It was because of Daniel that she had the means to live so comfortably on her salary, afford her classes, and begin planning for future advancement to earn her Masters Degree in Library Sciences.

The last time she had received a call from him had been on her twenty-first birthday, wishing her well from where he was stationed in northern Spain, and scouring up time to tell her he was planning on moving back to Lake Washington in another year. She was ashamed to have partially forgotten him in the upheaval of the last two months, but grateful to remedy that neglect by being given the opportunity to catch up.

"Not much," Daniel commented lightly, the vaguely muted sound of scraping cardboard audible over the line to counteract the claim. "I just flew in this morning, and am now trying to deal with my rather ridiculous collection of junk which—now that I think about it—I would have dealt with if I hadn't hired movers. I was wondering if my best girl would consent to a visit from her crotchety old uncle."

Lilith snorted, heartily amused. "Crotchety? Says the five-time Swiss Alpine Marathon champion."

"Yeah, yeah. But we can't always be young and fit, how can we?" His voiced shifted from sarcasm to affectionate worry within the span of a millisecond. "How are you doing, honey?"

"I'm fine," she assured him. "Just got up, so I'm still a bit out of it, but I'm…really good."

A steady warmth brushed her hip, the gentle touch of a hand slipping along her side to administer a soft caress to her backside. She jerked upright, startled by the abrupt touch, and whipped around to peer up at Azrael with slightly amused incredulity to meet his smiling eyes.

Drat him and his skillful hands! That one simple touch could have knocked the strength from her knees and dumped her to the floor. Or perhaps it was her body's heightened physical memory, because her blood was still simmering from his attempt to strip her bare in the other room.

Mouthing "_shoo"_ at him, she lightly pushed at his arm, still half-listening to her uncle chat at her about how glad he was that she was doing well and how important it was for her to take care of herself.

"—when you miss sleep and don't eat properly, it takes it out of you. You can get really sick if you aren't careful—"

Azrael's eyes flickered with laughter, their color warm with mischief. Flatly ignoring her hints, he grazed her bare arm with tender fingertips, dragging the thin strap of her nightdress down and off her shoulder. His lips smoothed over the newly bared skin, free hand creeping along the line of her waist in an attempt to snare her against the counter.

Swallowing a flustered noise, Lilith swatted at him with the flat of her hand, gripping the strap and forcing it back in place whilst stepping back to put space between them. Yet he merely slid to his knees, sleek and silent and catlike before her. She aimed a gentle kick at him, toes just grazing his ribs when he shifted out of the way; grinning like a Cheshire cat while his fingers slyly traced upward along the side of her ankle.

His large, gently-calloused hands smoothed over the bare flesh of her calf with a purposeful leisure, taking the fabric of her gown with them as they traveled upward as though to repeat what he had attempted in the bedroom. Apparently he refused to be foiled.

Lilith tried to nudge him away with her other knee, clinging to the edge of the counter to retain her balance with her ear still pressed to the phone; yet he remained unmoved. He merely continued taunting her with that sweet, sanity-consuming fire.

"—oh, I've been meaning to ask. Have you found a boyfriend yet?"

Attention rent cleanly in half, she caught the tail-end of the question just after her uncle had voiced it. Thoroughly distracted by the attentions of her guardian, she wanted to both clobber him over the head with the telephone and melt into a puddle of goo in the same breath, fighting for the focus to answer Daniel's most likely bated question.

Again she pushed at the angel with her knee, though she knew it was a hopeless endeavor. When he set his mind to something, no doubts alive, he was going to get it. And at the moment that seemed to be satisfying some undisclosed urge to undress her. Nearly sighing with exasperation, she pursed her lips and endured while Azrael shamelessly bared her thighs to the kitchen.

"I'm not…well, I suppose you could say that I have—"

"Oh, you have?" Daniel's voice was a parody of opposition; as light and pleased as it was protectively suspicious. "Well hallelujah! God knows you've needed a good man in your life. I just hope you're taking the proper precautions, young lady."

"Oh, for goodness sake! It's not like we're—" She cut herself off just in time to prevent the lie. Not sexually active? But that wasn't actually true, not anymore. Her cheeks flamed, it seemed, for the hundredth time that morning, and she hurriedly replaced the denial with a terse: "I'm not a _complete_ airhead, you know."

Azrael's light laughter was soft enough not to be heard over the phone, thank the Heavens. She felt it as a subtle vibration in his throat as he touched a soft kiss to the soft space of skin a few inches above her kneecap.

"I know you're not. You're likely better about those kinds of things than most girls your age, but I still worry about you. Anyway, you said yes?" There was a mischievous edge to her uncle's voice, an upturned lilt of crafty amusement as he added, "Good, healthy life in the bedroom? I hope he's managed to rid you of some of that tension you've been carrying around."

Was the entire _world_ set against her this morning?

"You're terrible," she snapped into the phone. "You'd think you had the hormones of a sixteen-year-old boy!"

This last was directed partially toward the angel at her feet, scowling when he simply smiled, devilishly charming, and calmly turned his attentions back to exploring the curvature of her leg with his fingers.

"Maybe," Daniel chuckled. "But I'd still like to meet him, if it wouldn't be too difficult for you to manage. I promise I won't do anything embarrassing." A short pause… "'Course, I'm telling you now that if I think he's no good, I'll throw him out on his arse. Nothing but the best for my girl."

Lilith couldn't help but smile in response to the overprotective threat. It might have seemed odd to an outsider, but Daniel had been more like a father to her than his brother ever had, despite living in another country for the majority of her life. He had cared for her from afar, and she supposed she shouldn't be surprised by his drive to ensure her comfort and safety. "I know you will, you old guard dog—"

The gasp cut into her words, shock fraying every nerve in her body as Azrael's casually creeping touch slid around the back of her thigh to fill his hand with the sloping flesh of her bottom and gently, playfully squeezed.

"Lilith?" Daniel's tone was edged with light concern in response to the sudden silence. "Are you ok?"

She mouthed wordlessly for a moment, shocked and scandalized when Azrael's mouth brushed against the delicate inside of her thigh with a light, feathery kiss, his fingers slipping beneath the fabric of her underwear to stroke the bare, sensitive flesh. Her joints ran to liquid, knees shivery and her grip at the counter white-knuckled to keep from sliding to the tiled floor in a heap.

How on earth did this happen? And how in god's name was she supposed to handle it? He'd already won his half-wagered war of persuasion, he'd crossed all the lines, stripped her of all her shields. What more could he possibly want from her enough to warrant this?

Vaguely, she recalled that her uncle was still on the phone, and that she should probably answer him.

"Ah—y-yes," she finally choked, forcing out the reply between carefully controlled breaths as shivers of fire raced along the trails of her veils, searing just underneath her skin. "I just…stubbed my toe—"

She bit down hard on her lower lip, swallowing a cry when the angel's lips brushed her flesh, his breath soft and hot against the thin cotton concealing the juncture of her thighs. Heat clenched in the pit of her stomach, coiling with a hunger that still seemed so utterly strange. The tiny shred of contact seemed to melt her to the bone, sent a spark of pleasure to curl about her tentatively arching spine, made her work to conceal the sound caught and restrained just on the tip of her tongue.

She could have _killed_ him.

While it was clear that Daniel was unconvinced, he accepted her excuse with a compliant, "ok, honey. Well, I was planning to hop over this Saturday to visit. Sound good?"

Fighting brutally against the tantalizing touches at such an intimate proximity to impropriety, Lilith wrenched herself into answering and put every ounce of effort she could muster into make it sound attentive and cheerful. "Saturday—sure! I'll see you then!"

Her uncle's assent and farewell were lost amid a flare of temper. Furious, she slammed the phone back down into its receiver and promptly slapped the palm of her hand against Azrael's white-blond head. Yet, a betrayal to her apparent rage, the hit was quite gentle. "What in the name of everything holy do you think you're _doing?_ You're acting like a starved—_that was my uncle!" _

She jerked away, yanking her dress back down over her legs, indignant and embarrassed.

"I know," was the infuriatingly smooth reply. He flashed her an unfairly dazzling smile and got to his feet, fluidly dwarfing her height within several graceful seconds.

She pointedly kept her eyes pinned to his face, flushing with the painful awareness of his lack of clothing, though somehow she knew he wasn't trying to unnerve her. He was just being casual—a contrary counterpoint to his usually quite formal presence in her life. In a way, it was one more sign of his comfort with her, which was sort of sweet.

"You—you do realize if he decides that he doesn't like you—"

"What? He'll kick me out and forbid me to come anywhere near you?" He gave a good-natured snort. "For the sake of his good intentions and male ego, I _might_ concede for a time. But you should know by now that I have absolutely no intention of letting you go." The tone of his voice dropped in volume and cadence, adopting a husky purr like that of rough silk as if to drown her witless in the melody of sound.

It might have worked, too, but for her fretting.

She scowled at him, green eyes blazing with irritation-fueled-embarrassment, and for a long moment he simply looked at her, calm and sweetly affectionate even after such a blatant admission.

"Oh, put some pants on," she snapped, conceding defeat and pushing passed him. She collapsed onto the living room couch, unsure whether she was angry because of his flippant lack of concern or because he had so effortlessly gotten under her skin. A lack of personal control that she couldn't bring herself to forgive.

When he ignored her order in favor of sitting beside her, sliding his arms about her waist and pulling her easily into his lap, she shoved moodily at his grip. "Don't be vexed," he told her softly, and in spite of herself, the old-fashioned wording brought her a small smile. "I couldn't have restrained myself even if I'd tried. You are simply too delicious to leave alone for long."

He touched the tip of a finger to the underside of her chin and pressed a gentle, lingering kiss to her lips; soulful eyes briefly closed to allow himself a moment of purely tender bliss.

Lilith could feel her blood surge with warmth in response to the murmured words with their double entendre and the soft pressure of his expressive mouth. Once again the tiny sliver of intimacy tuned her memory to recollect the raw, numbing pleasure of the night before, calling up the forbidden range of sensations that had been branded into her flesh.

She couldn't stay angry with him. She hadn't _truly_ been angry either, more amusedly scandalized by his brazenness. And in truth, she wasn't sure if she would have wanted him to behave any other way.

She may have viewed the intensity of his desire for her as intimidating and a little frightening when she had first considered conceding to it, but letting him touch her hadn't been the chore she had expected. She had actually rather enjoyed it.

He had made what she had thought to be an act of carnal brutishness and pain into something tender and wonderful. He had not treated her as a tool for his own pleasure, but had made her feel cherished and beautiful even despite the utter lack of experience she had offered him. It had been an act of pure spirituality, not of sin.

Once again he had soothed all her prudish preconceived notions and her naïve fears by proving to her how wrong she had been. He had proved to her – as he had once breathed into her ear – how very sweet his love could be.

Her cheeks flushed hot and pink, and, burying her face in his bare chest, she hid the blush from his sharp, inhuman eyes.

The quiet thrum of his laughter warmed her heart, so proud, so calm, so very unconcerned with everything but her, and she knew that nothing would ever make her happy like that sound could. He hugged her closer, tucking her into his chest as perfectly as if she had been crafted to fit there.

Yet within the affectionate embrace an arc of pain seared deep inside her abdomen, stabbing hard in a place she wasn't used to feeling so violently, and she choked on a quiet yelp. Immediately his grip eased, all playful cheer wiped away with nothing more than a swift shift of mental gears, cued by her pain. His body tensed beneath her, flesh turned to marble with concern, his voice urgent. "What is it?"

She shook her head, tucking her face back into the curve of his throat. "It's nothing. Just—aftereffects, I think."

Suddenly he was somber and his words were touched with guilt as he murmured, "I'm sorry…I didn't mean to hurt you." His left hand curled loosely around her waist, palm resting lightly against her stomach as if to apologize to the offended area.

But she scoffed, "I know you didn't. I don't blame you; it's just the way things are."

"Perhaps…" he was so quiet that she barely heard him, and a moment later, he was carefully lifting her from his lap to relocate her to the upholstery. His fingers crooked, forming a quick series of signs, and a small bundle of clothing shimmered into physical bearing within his other hand. He donned them right in front of her, much to Lilith's embarrassment, pulling on a pair of loose cotton slacks before dropping heavily back down again.

A shadow had fallen across his face, a dark, heavy brooding severity that she both recognized and feared. Whatever the focus was, she found herself unable to shake herself from the unease that had begun to creep across her heart.

She was not a virgin anymore. Her body no longer held the virtue of having never known a man's touch. It didn't bother her as much as she thought it would have, but then again, she had never considered what she would do if she found herself wanting more than a few kisses. Her relationship with Azrael had progressed so quickly that she hadn't had the time to catch up with her own emotions, let alone sort out how she felt about such things. And yet she regretted absolutely nothing.

He had asked her time and time again for her permission to continue, she could have stopped him at any time…but she hadn't. She had asked him with everything she had to be close to him, and she didn't regret it in the least. Quite the contrary, she was actually rather proud that she had persevered over something that had left such a prominent black mark on her life. But did he feel the same?

She chanced a glance his way, taking note of the tension in his posture, the weight that was clearly bearing down on his shoulders. Something was clearly troubling him. Could it be that he had come to the same conclusion she had? Could it be possible that because of his immortality, because of what he was and what he needed, she had nothing more to offer him?

She chewed at her lip, hesitant to put voice to the question, but she had to; if she didn't, the worry would slowly corrode her insides like an acid, twisting and festering for resolve. Finally she spoke up, asking softly, "what happens now?"

He didn't look at her, apparently still lost within his own burdened thoughts, but he had heard her voice and therefore turned his face slightly toward her, eyes still glazed with divided attention. "Hmm?"

"Where do we go from here?" she clarified, trying hard not to throw herself in his lap and plead with him not to leave her ever again. "Do…" she paused when her courage faltered and glanced down at her hands, finding herself somewhat surprised to see them clenched together, wringing the fabric of her nightgown into knots. "Do I have a use for you anymore?"

Azrael stiffened, the lines of his elegant figure tightening to the point of strain that she knew to associate with hostility, and very, very slowly, he turned to pin her motionless under a hard, incredulous stare.

The very air around her seemed to grow cold and she fought to suppress a shiver, alarmed by the anger clouding his darkened eyes, startled that his attention had become so complete and undivided so swiftly. His eyes flashed with scarlet before fading to a violet so deep that it was nearly black, the color a portrayal of exactly how frigidly dangerous she had made his mood. It was a look that chilled her to the core.

"I beg your pardon?" he murmured, silkily smooth even though she could sense the fury that flickered to life underneath the stern exterior, and darker still, the sharp, accented slur of his speech. "I'm _quite_ sure I didn't hear you correctly."

Her only response was to gaze back, wide-eyed, wondering what she possibly could have said to anger him so viciously. "I don't—"

"You thought," he interrupted harshly, his words clipped and rough with bitterness, "that your only worth was in being a _virgin?_"

The movement was so fast, sleek with the unintentional liquidity of the divinity that ran in his veins, powerful hands gripping her tightly by the arms, not painfully, but hard enough to drive the certainty of his displeasure through her mind. "Did you really think it matters—that it ever mattered? That it was the only reason I wanted you?"

She couldn't answer and he knew it, which left no option other than to stare mutely up at him as he slammed her concerns into the ground. The sheer weight of his emotion rushed into her like a wave, a whiplash of reflex that didn't startle her so much as make her very aware of the fact that she had said something extremely offensive. So much feeling, so heavy and dense, it was a little overwhelming to comprehend.

He had once assured her that nothing she could say would ever insult him, but he had been sorely mistaken. Judging by the look on his face, one would think his sense of propriety had just taken a blow low enough to be considered obscene.

Yet when he spoke again, the firmness of the words was met with a voice and manner that had softened, gentled by the massive amount of control he had upon his temper. "Your mind, heart and soul make you who you are. Virginity is a state of physical being, nothing more. Your body's knowledge—the amount of touch it has received—means very little. Not to me."

His eyes lowered from her face, a pained affection in his paled gaze. The grip at her shoulders gentled, the width of his hands sliding down her arms to lace his fingers with hers. It was an openly reassuring gesture and served as all the proof that he wasn't angry; she had just bruised his pride a little bit.

Properly chastised, Lilith followed his gaze to blink down at their joined hands and breaking the silence with a slow release of breath. He was right; she _was_ being ridiculous, whether or not he had said it in so many words. That had been an unfair assumption to make, an error in judgment driven by insecurity.

How could she have forgotten the courtesy he had shown her the night before or the sight of him sleeping so peacefully beside her? What, had she thought him some kind of incubus, living on the virginal hearts of women? Had he possessed such attributes, he wouldn't have been the kind of man to be so devotedly and unfailingly patient with her, nor would he have bothered to stay with her when he didn't need to.

Or perhaps he _had_ needed to, and _that_ was what made him different.

He needed just as much from her as she did from him. It was the very reason for his ever having approached her.

Turning abruptly she threw her arms around him, flatly disregarding the little twinge of pain that sparked a protest within her belly. "I'm sorry," she craned her neck and kissed his cheek. "You're right, I just…"

Her voice faded into silence, running out of words because she didn't know the ones she wanted to use. She felt strange. Though comforted by his assurances of dismissive lack of care to her physical state, she still felt somehow incomplete and she didn't know why or even how to describe it.

Uncertain and just a little concerned, she leaned into him, fingers curling around his shoulder. It was comfort she sought, and reassurance, things that touch had always seemed to contain, and she reached for them both hopefully and a little desperately. She laid her head against the arc of his collar, listening to the beat of the heart, steady and strong, under the cool flesh.

Azrael tilted his chin to look down at the soft dark hair that veiled half his chest. The touch of his hand to her back served as the focus for a glimpse into the unconscious slice of worry festering within her. Though she may not have understood it, he could read the lack of confidence and fear. As much as it distressed him to see in her such unhappiness, the knowledge that the prospect of losing him had caused it created a completely different emotion.

"Oh, sweetling," he soothed, a soft chuckle shaped from his relief. "You needn't fear I will abandon you now. I'm not so shallow, nor so easily appeased."

She lifted her head to look at him, bright green eyes slightly puzzled and more than a little lost.

"It seems you are under the impression that we're at an impasse—an ending," he added, and when her pulse leapt in reply he knew that addressing the issue now had been a good choice. "But that couldn't be farther from the truth."

She closed her eyes and sighed. "Do you _always_ speak in riddles?"

He laughed, tugging gently at a lock of her hair as a form of playful punishment. "What I mean is: we haven't taken any final steps. Nothing has finished, but rather grown more complicated." Azrael's arm tightened about her waist to keep her cradled where she had settled upon his lap as he told her quietly, seriously, "we have lain together, and yet I want you just as badly as I did before. Even more so…if that's possible."

Lilith stared up at him with barely concealed traces of alarm coloring the edges of her face with a pretty blush of pink. "How _is_ that possible?"

She stopped, breaking into quiet just after the question left her mouth, consumed with a rush of wonder. Did that mean the greeting he had given her upon waking, and then again when he had all but assaulted her when she was tied up with the phone, it was because he was still so powerfully attracted to her?

But that didn't make any sense. He had seen – known, felt – everything now, there was no suspense, no mystery. He had won his victory, his prize. Wasn't that where it ended?

And yet perhaps, like most of her other preconceptions, this was an error in her judgment. He had stayed for a reason and it wasn't because he pitied her, the poor mortal woman-child with her shattered paranoia and her massive emotional hangover. That much she knew.

Azrael's response came in the form of a soft, lingering kiss to the edge of her mouth, a tender caress to the rosy skin beneath his lips while his free hand snaked downward a few perilous inches to rest against her thigh. "To me," he murmured, "your taste is as strong and sweet as if I had never known it before. But the knowing makes it that much more wonderful."

Instead of getting tense and rigid to counteract the intimate heat that flushed her veins, she could feel her body yielding to it. Her bones were weak, her breath shallow and sharp as the fleeting impulse to strip him of earthly clothing and smother her senses with his scent and his touch rose to an almost overwhelming point.

"I will never stop desiring you—any part of you." He smiled against her cheek. "I told you, I am completely and utterly besotted."

She shivered under the impact of violent, nigh on hysterical want blazed across her mind as his lips grazed her skin. That one simple touch twisted with the low pitched melody of his voice to reach inside her and pull. Everything within her was wound tight as a metal spring, though the vessel that carried that spring melted invitingly with acquiescence to the courtly way of admitting that she was still thrillingly desirable. That she had such a generous power over him.

That was when she realized no matter what happened, no matter how much time passed, she would never now be rid of her need for him. Like a drug with an irreversible, incurable dependency, she would never now be satisfied by anything or anyone but him.

He tilted his chin, his breath soft against her face, and she felt the brush of something not too far from anticipation touch her in secret, sensitive places when his perfect lips edged so close to her waiting mouth.

Yet she didn't let him kiss her again. Suddenly rather frustrated by the violent swing from mild annoyance to such potent desire, she wrenched herself sideways, snatching a convenient pillow from the couch and hiding her face behind it while he threw back his head and laughed.

"I see I'm not alone. Good. Now you understand what I endured for those eight long years."

She lifted her eyes over the plush corner to send him a vivid glare, but quickly ducked her head again when everything from her nose to the tips of her toes warmed beneath his blue-flushed-violet gaze; a color that bordered on the fine edge between affectionate interest and fully-blown arousal. "Oh, be quiet," she snapped instead, though the words didn't quite conceal the tremor that laced her speech.

He simply smiled, gentle and loving, and shifted to cradle her against his firmer, broader body. With her back nestled into his chest and his head resting lightly against hers, he murmured softly, "I love you too."

The sigh she gave him in reply was exaggeratedly annoyed, but her hand was gentle when she reached backward to gently finger-comb the fine, pale hair that spilled in feathery tendrils against his neck. She was calm, related, and felt so utterly complete there, enfolded inside the comfort and security of him, breathing and warm and wonderful.

They may have been there for an hour, or three, or for only ten minutes, Lilith wouldn't have been able to tell. But it was a moment spared from all haste or concern, just the treasured, tender presence of someone who loved her more than words could ever describe.

A while later, as the sunlight began to ebb to a shade that spoke of later afternoon from where it peeked in from behind the half-drawn curtains, Azrael stirred just enough to muse absently, "if my internal clock is still correct, today is Friday."

"Hmm? What about it?" Lilith responded, feeling sleepy and somewhat slower than usual. He was just so warm and comfy, like a big cat curled up around her, with that near-soundless thrum of magic that resembled a purr radiating from his body. She didn't want to move, let alone think.

He smiled, eyes still closed. "Didn't your uncle say he was coming this Saturday?"

Silence reigned as she processed, before the room was rent with her piercing shriek of, "oh _no!_"

She sprang from his lap, the reflex of dismay jolting her into action, and promptly sank back down to the cushions for the ache in her abdomen, upon which he scolded, "For goodness' sake, don't _do_ that if it pains you!"

Grimacing, she paid little mind to her guardian's fussing and the palm he pressed to her abdomen as if to feel for the injury causing her grief (natural and minor as it was). The clock above the dining alcove informed her that it was almost two o'clock, just short by a couple minutes and a few ticks of the second-hand. Frowning, she muttered, "I have to buy food and clean and—"

With a heavy shake of her head, she brushed the matter aside and tucked herself back against Azrael's side, his arm curving automatically around her shoulders. She didn't want to go back to the real world, not just yet. She just wanted to rest there, serene and quiet, in the arms of the man she loved.

Smoothing her hand against the firm plane of his chest, she murmured, somewhat muffled by his shirt, "could we just…stay like this, for a little while longer? Please?"

For a moment, he was perfectly still, almost as though he had needed to catch his breath. "Ah, my darling," he whispered, and the sound was as painfully beautiful as the song of a nightingale. "You have no idea how long I have yearned for you to ask just that question."

Her smile was somewhat bashful, a sweet, blushing pleasure found both in the endearment and in the faithful pledge he had made, his sheer, unwavering devotion to her. That same devotion which had inspired him to thrash the bloody sense out of that demon and get himself impaled. Devotion which hadn't brought him to tell her that such a thing wouldn't tear him from her life.

Part of her didn't want to ask, but something told her that it was important. That she needed to know.

She schooled her tone carefully, keeping it as light and accusation-free as she could, and inquired, "Why did you let me believe you were going to die? I know it was stupid to—you're immortal after all, but…"

Though he didn't put any space between them, for which she was grateful, he stiffened beneath her weight. It wasn't a comfort to feel him stern and hard, and the abrupt change in his mood was a little frightening, but his halting, strangely clumsy answer came without chastisement or scorn for having the audacity to question him. Instead there was a tremulous, mortified shadow of guilt so heavy with regret that made her ache in the most awful way.

"I'm so sorry, I—the explanation is crueler than…"

She heard him swallow, hard, as though there had been something in his throat barring the clarity from his speech, and she lifted her face to look at him with concern shining in her eyes, which twisted his expression with sorrow.

"It was selfish," he said, and each word came as though laced with poison, "I didn't plan it to begin with, but the opportunity was there and I…decided to use the situation to evaluate your feeling for me."

She peered at him, puzzled by the answer she had not expected. "It was a test?"

The sound of his humorless laughter was hard with the bruise of shame. "Can you believe that I could be so blinded by greed that I would let you suffer for nothing more than the sake of my ego? When I was healing in Eden and I could hear you call—_feel_ your _pain._" He turned his face away from her, a gesture heavy with shame. "It was a cruel thing to do."

She could feel his anger, the convoluted mass of feeling that was disappointment, disgrace, and such vivid remorse that it seemed to become viscous and creep into her through the coolness of his skin. She could tell that he spoke the truth; he saw his action as cruelty. But to her own surprise, she found she disagreed.

"No," she argued quietly, "it wasn't. I think I may have needed it."

He shot her a wounded look. "How can you condone it? I _hurt_ you, Lilith! There is _no_ excuse for that."

Reaching with tentative fingers, she laid her hand against his cheek, feeling something tender and warm unfold inside her chest when he unconsciously leaned into the touch. If she had felt any anger or hurt about the matter before, it had left her. All she felt now was affection and understanding.

"But if you hadn't, how long would it have taken me to figure out I wanted to be with you? Another week? A month? Another five years?" The somewhat reproachful look he shot her said quite clearly that he thought she was being overly dramatic, but she ignored it. "I thought I would never see you again, and that shock made me realize that I hadn't wanted to lose you."

He was watching her so closely, so completely focused that her cheeks began to heat and, blushing, she lowered her eyes.

"There was so much more I wanted to ask. I wanted to talk with you again, and dance with you. And see you smile. And I—I wished I'd let you do more than just kiss me."

Something in his face softened, gentled, wiped clean of some of the terrible guilt. He said nothing, sensing that it wasn't yet time for his words. But he folded her hand in his own, pressing his lips to the outside curve of her thumb while he waited, touched far more deeply than she could have known.

"All I'm saying is that maybe it was better you did. And I'm not mad at you, I just wanted to understand—"

Azrael kissed her and she went quiet, pulled forward into the sturdy build of his chest by the tug at her hand. The touch was so tender that she could have melted into a senseless puddle of goo, and for a moment she seriously thought she might cry. But she didn't. The swelling mass of the happiness beneath her breastbone replaced the prickling hint of tears before they even had a chance to finish forming.

When he finally pulled back she looked up from where she was cradled like a child upon his lap, and when she met his gaze, the loving lilt of his smile tied blissful knots around the softer places in her heart.

"You surely are," he murmured, and it could have been a prayer for the dense amount of feeling she could hear in his voice, "the most beautiful woman I have ever known. For your forgiveness when I have no right to be forgiven and for all the other precious things you have given me."

She was blushing again; she could feel it hot and furious in her cheeks. "I think you're biased."

He gave her point some thought. "I suppose that could be part of it, but it's difficult not to be when my charmingly prudish ward has finally allowed me to love her." The gentle spark in his eyes flushed to a full-out glow, brilliant with the ardent warmth of passion and pride, adoration and awe. "For which I am both grateful and honored."

Tucking her face into the curve of his neck, Lilith sighed and mused, "I guess I'm not a prude anymore."

"You certainly didn't act like one. But I always knew you were of a sensual nature beneath all those shields."

In response to that she promptly smacked her palm against his shoulder, prompting the angel's soft laughter and another onslaught of kisses.


	33. Promise not to Tell?

**Chapter 51: Promise not to Tell?**

Recommended Listening: "Aníron" by Enya and "Yellow" by Coldplay

* * *

He sang while he worked, a low, clear crooning as sweet as a nightingale. The scraping of his hands against the wall seemed obsolete paired with it, as if the dreamy, faraway melody held more power even than the force that had driven the needle-knife deep into the sheetrock of her bedroom wall. It was taking him a while to extract it, as he had claimed he rather wanted to avoid bringing the apartment down around their heads, the magical method of hollowing the plaster and matter away from the barb to free it slow but highly efficient. Still, by the time he'd decided to take to the job with gusto worthy of an inspiration-driven artisan, she'd almost forgotten that she was new to sharing a living space with another person, despite the fact that the angel wasn't really living with her.

Something about watching prim, dutiful Azrael working like he did, bent over the job presented clearly before him with such a driven, purposeful, yet still so calm air drove her to a sense of remarkable fondness. He took to his self-appointed task with a fine, dexterous grace, nimble of fingers and generous of patience with his hair tied back and his shirt-sleeves rolled up to bare sleek white forearms up to the elbows and freeing artistically slim hands that gave only the illusion of delicacy. More than once when she would duck into the bedroom between spurts of frantically cleaning the apartment to take a rest she would find herself cooing to herself over him. She would stop and listen to the songs he sang in that ethereal voice of his, the lush notes that dripped like honey from his gifted tongue, quite taken with the pleasure of hearing his voice. Once she found a point where she couldn't really do anything more to improve her already nearly spotless home did she settle on the foot of her bed, resting her palms on the mattress and devoted herself to listening and watching him as he used his magic to fix up the mess in her wall.

Truly, he shouldn't have bothered, she could have just called someone to have it done, but he had taken up the mantle of the job himself, and she saw no real reason to argue with him about it. He didn't seem to be exerting much effort either, just a good deal of patience and tiny, precise movements with his right hand, held several inches from the surface his other palm was pressed flat against. The spell wasn't very fancy either, no sparks or glowing or much physical to show anything was happening at all, but she knew there was – if simply for the scraping noise harmonizing grossly with the song cradled in his throat.

Such a sad song, full of such longing, and not a word of it could she understand. Not that it hindered the beauty any.

"Is that one of the songs you heard growing up?" she asked him, hoping she didn't distract him too much. Or maybe she did…

He didn't answer right away, but paused, absolutely motionless, silent as stone, for about five seconds before his fingers closed around the visible length of the needle and pulled it smoothly from the wall, accompanied by a quiet noise of victory. Setting the undamaged (and completely spotless) weapon on the top of her dresser, he offered her a smile and shook his head. "In a way, I suppose. More like it is a song from the heavens—humans are not the only ones with ballads." Turning his head back to the hole and the cracks that spread out from it like broken glass, he smoothed his hand over the wound in the wall, taking measure of the depth and damage done by the demonic strength that had put it there. The next moment, when she looked at it, the wall had sealed itself, completely healing the wounds in its plaster-and-sheetrock flesh.

With a shake of her head, she lamented, "you are seriously amazing."

Eyes flashing wide with surprise, he shot her a glance over his shoulder that was actually rather alarmed. "I—what?"

"Amazing," she repeated with a sweet smile as she got to her feet and crossed the span of the room. He watched in a spell of still, muted silence, eyes following the path her small body took to get to him and reach out with a small, soft hand to touch the now flat, flawless wall with its plain white paint. "So many talents!" Leaning down, she kissed the tip of his nose. "Thanks for healing my wall."

"I doubted you would want to keep a reminder of…that." He didn't so much as mention the events of the trying night specifically, let alone speak the name of the demon who had virtually kidnapped and threatened her, but from the shadowed expression that turned his marble face to pitiless stone for the briefest instant was enough to get his meaning across. And he was right, anyhow. The shattered remnants of the vase had been thrown out purposely so she wouldn't remember the way Malik had sent the weapon whistling through the air to crack the pottery as though he would very much have liked to do so to every bone in her body. Just the thought made her work to conceal a tiny shiver of recollected fear.

Seeming to know exactly what she was thinking, Azrael circled her waist with his arms and pulled her gently down to take a light perch on his bent knee, tucking her against his chest with all the affectionate comfort of a cuddling pet – even somehow managing to purr while he nuzzled his face into the curve of her neck. She was so much smaller in stature than he was, oddly delicate, though he wasn't truly very large at all. It didn't take much to dwarf her. The smile he gave her went unnoticed, hidden by the fragile line of her pale neck and the soft spill of her rich, nut brown hair. His hands spanned the slim circle of her waist, so utterly tiny, though he knew she didn't see herself with near the amount of reverence he did, just as she thought her breasts too small and her legs too bulky from dancing so religiously. But from an outside point of view (if not exactly objective), he thought she was beautifully natural, nothing unfitting to anything but what was good and real. Yes, she was slender and constructed finely, yes, she was strong in the legs…but he found it attractive.

She had grown into her loveliness quite nicely, having been a charmingly bewitching child. The little girl's heart-shaped face had remained, even if the detailed features had smoothed out with the years to hone her into the makings of an adult and the moon had reshaped her into the very essence of womanhood. From the sweet, innocent naivety of an infant she'd had him trapped in her open palm, and almost nothing had changed. Nothing but the methods she used to keep him there with no chain but his own will. Everything from the soft, kind curve of her lip to the touch of her fine, delicate hands to the shapely curve of her thigh down to the calf was purely Lilith – and he loved her for it, because he had watched her grow into herself, just as he had been fortunate enough to witness her grow to let him in.

With a quiet sigh of contented adoration, he squeezed her closer, listened to her giggling when his fingers snuck around to dig into her ticklish side. Smacking him lightly across the shoulder in retaliation, she turned and wrapped her arms around his neck to give him a more generous hug; her mildly-feisty mood gentled by the way his palms rested tender against her back. "I have to go buy food," she told him, mourning the fact that she couldn't simply stay there in his arms for the rest of the evening. "Do you want to come—or do you have somewhere to be?"

"Both," he answered; smiling faintly when she shot him a look which said very clearly that he hadn't answered her question at all. "I am behind schedule by nearly a day, and I do have some visitations to make, but I have a little time to spare. I would much rather accompany you."

She slid free and got to her feet, stretching softly with a casual arch of her slender back. "Is that because you really want to come, or because you're paranoid?" she accused, padding back across the bedroom floor to search for a suitable sweater to fight off the cold weather sure to be raging outside, and he could have sworn she let her hips sway just a little more than was altogether necessary – not that he made an effort to look away…

A small lilt of ironic laughter caught her ear as she was extracting a plain white pearl-button cardigan from a drawer and she turned in time to watch him stand, drawing a faint symbol to conjure his sleek black jacket out of nowhere. "I find it amusing that you see fit to lecture _me_ about paranoia." His smile could have melted her heart to a molten mess. "I was under the impression that you were the obsessively-phobic one here. And I am not certain that paranoid is the right description. _Possessive,_ perhaps—"

"What, you don't trust me alone in public?" her glance was torn between bemused and vaguely insulted over the sock drawer while lifting out a pair to wear.

"Something like that."

She threw the socks at him, which he caught easily and handed back with a touch of even more beautiful laughter when she held out an expectant palm. "Ugh, _men!_" she lamented loudly, but she couldn't quite conceal the fondness that laced the exaggerated tone even if she had wanted to.

* * *

"How about brussel sprouts?"

A grimace was flashed toward the package he held up for her to assess, a feigned tinge of nausea as she gagged, "eww!"

He hid a chuckle behind an exclamation of surrender. "All right, that would be a _no._" The bag of vegetables was placed back in the refrigerated bin along with its fellows, rejected quite bluntly by his partner's display of disgust.

"That was a _no way in heck,_" came her correction while she took another perusal of the array of selected frozen veggies and snatched up two bags of carrots, tossing them into the basket hanging from the crook of Azrael's arm. Such a gentleman, he was – he'd plucked the thing from her almost the very instant she had bent and picked it up under the pretense that she shouldn't be carrying anything in her state. Which she knew was utter baloney, because he would have done it anyway. With a distracted nod while she checked the vegetable off her list, she headed for the bakery section. "Last stop…" she told him, looking over the little slip of paper sliced with her crossed-off items. She'd already gotten the roast; pasta shells, cheese, and pepper for her side dish of spicy noodle-salad; and veggies, though deciding what would go well had been a bit of a trick. Rolls were the final touch for a good meal, she always felt.

A bag of nice dinner rolls was settled into the basket atop the rest, and she was just starting to feel a little less stressed about tomorrow, when she remembered something. "Oh, I should buy some wine for a welcome home, celebratory present." Daniel was a regular wine connoisseur, a true drinker even though he despised the social intrigue that often accompanied others who shared the particular trait. At a wine-tasting, he would have been the only one dressed in jeans and dog-tags with messy hair and needing to shave compared with the fancy, suit-and-jewel laden peacocks who generically enjoyed that sort of thing. Not that he was a slob, but he just didn't care under most circumstances. It would be a nice little present for him, since she'd missed her favorite uncle for so long; but Lilith didn't consume alcohol, and she had no idea how to pick any.

"Hmm. Well, let us investigate."

She followed his lead as he led her back across the store toward the liquor section, which was actually the neighboring shop-space converted to house the so dearly-loved commodity of booze. During business hours, the adjoining doors would be open, as they were now, and she trailed after her companion for the first time, taking in the numerous racks of bottles ranging from the larger wines and odd-shaped drinking liquors to cooking bottles and the tiny little shot-containers. How a store could hold so much alcohol was purely a mystery, but if it suited her purpose, she didn't mind so much.

"Excuse me," Azrael hailed one of the workers, who stepped out from behind one of the racks with a typical salesman's smile spread across his face. "What do you have by the way of a good, dry red wine?"

The man nodded and gestured toward an artistically-placed display of bottles atop an old-fashioned beer-barrel at the end of the aisle. "We have a Merlot, very affordable and great with heartier…"

Azrael was very lightly shaking his head, causing the light from above to shine along the soft gold strands of his hair. "I was thinking something a little finer. A Burgundy, perhaps?" Something in the eyes of the grizzle-haired salesman changed, as if he suddenly realized that his customer was not the everyday wine-drinker to be asking for that particular name. With a distinctly more interested smile, he beckoned them over to a far corner of the store, which looked no different to Lilith's eyes, but seemed much more acceptable to the angel next to her.

"May I ask what the entrée would be?"

"Beef," she answered, observing with curious eyes the way Azrael plucked a bottle from the shelf and read the label with a reminiscent gleam flickering over his expression.

The salesman glanced at it as well and faintly beamed with approval. "1873 _Montrachet,_" he remarked fondly, "an excellent vintage of _Grand Cru _making. I compliment your taste, sir."

"Thank you," the angel mused graciously, and handed it over to be purchased. "This will do nicely." In the snippet of time between Azrael holding out the bottle and the immensely pleased salesman taking it to the register to ring up the total (and offering to do so with the rest of their purchases as well, which was nice of him), Lilith caught sight of the price and nearly had a heart-attack. She had never seen such a high number on an item meant for consumption, and while she gulped like a fish drowning on air her delicate fingers dug into Azrael's forearm, eyes wider than dinner-plates, mouthing wordlessly as he looked down and smiled, tenderly patting her head. "Calm down, I will be paying for that. Consider it my contribution, since you are the one who decided to slave away in the kitchen for the majority of tomorrow."

"But it's—" he bent his head and touched a soft, sweet kiss to the corner of her mouth. By the time he pulled away, she was nicely flushed and willing to give in. "Ok then, it's your wallet."

With a tiny little laugh, he noted, pleased with the victory, "much better," and forked over a good number of bills to the salesman while Lilith looked away to avoid cracking her teeth from gritting them too hard over the waste of so much money. She did, however, refuse to let him pay for her groceries, going so far as to threaten not to let him touch her for a week if he tried – which worked like a charm, and left her gloating over her newfound secret weapon when he backed away from the counter with wide lavender eyes and a small touch of pleading to his expression.

It was bitter cold outside, a reminder that it was finally December at last and the very peak of winter. The frost was brutal, nearly as thick upon the air as it was dusted across the ground in fragile lacy patterns and every breath was like taking millions of miniscule chips of ice into the throat and lungs to melt into a sheet of cold which turned into a steady ache of chill from nose to chest and beyond. She cuddled close to her escort to combat the icy air just as she lifted her face to the unfeeling grayish sky, smiling for her love of the season despite the havoc it wreaked on her physically. Always having been something of an oddball for this, she couldn't help adoring the winter for its difference from the rest of the seasons. Any other season could be rainy or rich with sunshine, but only winter could paint the entire world like a palace of glass. It also brought so many reasons to be warm and cozy inside to look out at the whiteness that humbled mankind so ruthlessly – and no one expected her to run around in public in a bathing suit.

Her foot slid on the slick pavement, a warning that she hadn't been paying much attention to where she was putting her feet, causing her to stumble. Though Azrael's arm twined with her own prevented her from falling flat on her back by tightening ever so slightly, her abdomen gave a twinge low and slightly sick with a tiny stab of fading, leftover pain. "Ooh," she curled lightly, just barely, the smallest hint that she had felt anything, but her escort noticed and his face darkened upon realizing what the hurt was spurned from. Still he felt guilty? Even after she had prostrated herself half into his lap to convince him of the opposite? Sweet, but…a little frustrating that he didn't believe her.

"Take an aspirin when you get home," he told her softly, so soft that it seemed emotionless but for the tiny hint of sympathy she caught at the end of the sentiment, "it might get rid of that."

"I'm perfectly fine," was her retort after straightening and renewing her clutch at the bend of his elbow. "And don't you mean _we?_"

His right hand adjusted its grip on the bags of shopping held between his fingers as he offered a light, tight-lipped smile – firm, yes, but lovely. "I will leave you at the corner." The note in his voice turned a little wry, "I fear if I stay with you much longer I might not be able to force myself to leave—and I really must see to those visitations." He didn't say it out loud, but the implication that he also might do something more…romantically inspired if he stayed with her was crystal clear underneath the cool outertone of his spoken words. It made her a little unhappy with the prospect of his imminent departure, because she rather felt another impromptu rendezvous might just do them both some good.

_Excuses, excuses._ She blushed; embarrassed by the various scenarios creeping into her head and very thankful her companion was incapable of reading her mind.

The corner that came nearer almost as he mentioned it, just off the main property of her apartment complex, drew an old parallel to a time when coming to that very place meant she could soon he free of his piercing, eagle-eyed watch. But now it was saddening to know she would be left alone, the prospect no longer offering any sense of freedom as it had no so very long ago. He came to a stop as she did, handing over the plastic bags of groceries he'd carried for her and leaning just slightly down and to the right to kiss her flushed, frost-touched cheek. "Take an aspirin," he repeated gently, "and I will see you tomorrow to formally…_meet_ your uncle."

Something in his smile hinted at some secret bit of information he was withholding, but she let it pass, deciding that it was inconsequential for the moment. She lifted a hand and briefly stroked his cheek with the back of it, the surface cold and hard as marble until the warmth beating under her own skin was absorbed and mirrored upon the chilly plane of his face. "Oh," the response was uplifted, strange for how much she quickly glommed onto and anticipated seeing him again, and sent him a bright smile to light up her pretty, heart-shaped face, soften her stubborn chin, and gleam in her green eyes as she turned to ascend the stairs with a cheery wave. "Have a good night!"

"_Un dei,_" he whispered before letting the winter air swallow the imprint of his body with a swift, subtle transience between realms. Effortless as breathing, quiet as shadow, a whisk of pale feathers – refreshed and renewed from tattered and bloodied, bright and clean and shining upon a pure black background, powerful eyes keen and watchful again after centuries of steady decay.

All for her, though it was the one facet of the sequential dream she managed to miss.

Not needing to look back to know he'd gone, Lilith made her way up the steps to her floor, the trip turned somewhat awkward by the bags that hindered her finer sense of mobility. Nothing on her planned menu required overnight preparation and she had already brought her living quarters to a state of slightly unnatural cleanliness; so there wasn't much to do but heat up a bowl of leftover spaghetti and curl up in front of the television to watch some old X-Files reruns after putting away her groceries. And even despite feeling both a tiny bit restless and keyed-up for what tomorrow might bring, she fell asleep only an hour after finishing her dinner and downing the pain pill Azrael had insisted she take.

Sprawled across her couch, oblivious to the world, she found a glimpse of the vaguely familiar bird-shape wheeling in a world of darkness, calling to her with gratitude in its voice and a brilliant silver sheen to its sleek white plumage as it flew toward her and settled happily upon her extended forearm. It settled as though at home there on her wrist, heavy, but not to the point of becoming unbearable, preening one glorious wing with a silver beak while she watched it, contented and warm with affection cradled in her insides like some vaporous talisman. Then, slowly, it turned its head to look at her, and she realized with a shock of dream-muted understanding what she was looking at within the unnaturally purple eyes of the falcon that stared her down with something very like love reflected in the expression that no earthly bird would know.

_You brought me back._

His voice; spoken through the soundless cry of a raptor's steely glare, and the echoes of something more. Something…greater.

_I was fading, but you brought me back. Thank you._

* * *

When she woke it wasn't as easily as falling asleep, though it was nearly as quick. Her eyes snapped open and her back straightened as she sat up with a startled jolt. But for the past few hours the sleep had been utterly dreamless once the departure of the great white bird had left her alone in the dark, and for a long, confused moment she puzzled over what could have woken her so abruptly. Green eyes flickered sleepily around in a slow survey of the room in attempt to pinpoint the source of the unconscious alarm, noting the soft spill of light from between the curtain veiling the glass windowpanes just over the couch where she lay in her half-rumpled state. But nothing was out of place. There was nothing odd – nothing to warrant such a violent start into consciousness.

She was just thinking to check the time, blinking vaguely in the direction of the clock when the knocking came again, loud and persistent rapping at her apartment's front door. That would be Daniel…oh crap, how late had she overslept? Had she really been that tired? Lurching to her feet, she raced for the door, ignoring the dizzying rush of blood to her temples as she skittered clumsily across the linoleum hall floor to fumble with the locks and yank the barrier open, quick and jerky with a mixture of nerves and guilt. She hadn't seen her uncle in person since she'd been tiny; truth be told, she was a little on the anxious side. After taking a deep, soothing breath, she lifted her eyes just in time to let out a high-pitched squeak of surprise when she was seized around the waist and wrapped up in one of her uncle's wiry-armed bear-hugs.

"Lilith!" The exclamation was exuberant, the warm affection to his familiar voice far, far too cheerfully awake (due to years upon years of early rising). Firm and strong in the way of good, solid human flesh, he squeezed her tightly before pulling back to look at her.

He was just as she remembered him, if a little less rugged around the edges as he'd been in his younger years. Daniel Everett was a good-looking man, just like his brother had been; with rounded, moderate features and a slim, quick build made tough with training-brought muscle. His kind eyes were greenish hazel behind his wire-rimmed glasses, a shade that echoed the vivid green his niece would inherit from his mother's side of the family, the lanky cut of his hair a rich sepia black just barely shaded with the gray that told of his older age. The military had kept him fit, as did his passion for long-distance running (one that Lilith had never understood), and within his generous smiles lay a hint of the devilish, teenage heartthrob that he had once been.

There was a trace of sheepish guilt lingering at the edges of his expression, a half-grimace mirroring the apology in his tone as he said, "I'm sorry, sweetheart, did I wake you?"

"No, no!" she chirped, insistently shaking her head as she stepped aside and beckoned him into the entryway. "I would have been up soon anyway." He smiled, playfully tugging at her mussed, tangled ponytail, and she returned it with a slightly embarrassed one of her own. "The living room's just down the hall—make yourself comfortable, I'm going to go change," she glanced down at herself, the pair of gray sweatpants and the too-large red t-shirt, and grimaced before trotting meekly off toward her bedroom with her uncle's cheering noise of amusement to follow her.

Lilith had always been quick to change her clothes (probably aided by a good few years of hairy backstage quick-changes), and she was especially so now; throwing on a pair of nice, black work slacks and a soft dark blue sweater of a lightweight knit. It was her favorite of her weighty selection of sweaters in her possession, the material so lush and nice that it was like a tiny slice of heaven in garment form; and it made her torso look curvier than it really was. Not that it was a lifelong goal to give herself the image of a perfect body, but she was just vain enough to care at least a little bit. Besides, she felt she had a few reasons to want to look a bit nice. With slippers shoved over bare feet, she tottered to her bathroom to brush her teeth, dab on a small bit of pale, smoky gray shadow to give her eyes some depth, and run a comb through her hair before whipping the dark mass into a loose, sloppy knot at the base of her neck.

It took her a moment of debating on whether or not she wanted to do anything fancier, what, she wasn't quite sure, and she hovered over her small assortment of jewelry with her lip pinned liberally between her teeth and her hand frozen over the box of wood inlaid into a puzzle design. A thrift store find, and a lucky one, as was much of her jewelry, because she was much too stingy to spent her wages on trivial, useless things like earrings. She had never really understood the romanticized crap surrounding diamonds either – how could a cold chunk of rock symbolize warmth or love? But she owned a little bit, a few simple pieces for occasional accessorizing if needed. And it was purely out of exasperation-related self-chiding that made her hand fall to the plain sterling, cursive L on its matching chain to add a bit of shine.

Deeming herself passable for having just woken up quite ungracefully, she pattered into the living room to plop down on the couch just across from the soft, padded chair Daniel had chosen to occupy. He chuckled, amused by her show of haste while she sat and allowed herself a few shallow, steadying breaths with flushed cheeks. "Goodness," he began, crossing his ankles in a cool, casual manner as he eyed her appraisingly, and she tolerated it despite not much appreciating stares. "Just _look_ at you…last I knew you were no bigger than a kitten—now you're such a lovely young lady." The new smile that curved his firm lips was touched with pride, strong and deep; and though she knew perfectly well why the pride was there, she still found herself blushing rather magnificently in response to his compliments.

It was something that was long silent between them now after almost four years of his mentioning his guilt because he'd had to leave her to be raised in an abusive home. Four years of her repeated reassurances that she didn't blame him, that she knew he couldn't have taken her in, that she knew he loved her like his own daughter. She could never hold him accountable for his brother's deeds; not only because it wasn't his fault to begin with, but because he hadn't been aware of what Joseph had been doing to his child until he'd been called up to give verbal and written testimony to support his niece's quest for emancipation two months after her sixteenth birthday. Daniel had been so unspeakably horrified by the accounts of his brother's sins to the point of nearly breaching his military contract to fly to the States to take Lilith into his own charge…or to give Joseph Everett the worst whipping of his life.

Somehow she had managed to convince him it wasn't necessary, that she'd be fine on her own, to which he'd calmed down and admitted that since she had recorded enough proof on her own and taken the legal actions all on her own, he was sure she was right. It had also been the same day he'd started sending her checks in the mail, bless him.

As vibrantly passionate as he was smart, Daniel had been everything she had wished her real father had been to her. He had kept in regular contact, asking her about school and dance, listening to her chat about her friends – always with the kindly warmth of parenthood that made one think of cuddling together on a couch to read picture books, hot cocoa with marshmallows, rubber duckies, and other such simple childhood pleasures. Even when he'd backed off a bit when she got a little older, he would still find the time to send her cards on her birthday and at Christmas, wrote her letters, and he was never afraid to offer up advice whether or not she asked him for it. For the longest time, she hadn't thought there would ever be anyone as caring or attentive to her as he was; her adopted father by her father's blood. For years he had been the only man in her life seen through eyes round with a child's instinctual love instead of contempt.

Something had changed. She wasn't blind enough to miss the slightest edge of distance that lingered between them, coloring her living room with the subtle tinge of awkwardness. Space grows between parent and child over time, everyone knew this, it was a natural fact and something that happened without permission or much direct notice. But right then she could feel it more clearly than she had before when she'd begun to lead the life of an adult for herself, elevated from the status of a little girl freed from the legal shackles of faux guardianship. It was strange; for all the stories that told of moments like these, all the whispered legends from her peers about their fathers adopting the brusque, drill-sergeant mannerisms when the hint of _boyfriend_ came creeping across the path, she had never expected to find herself in the exchange of charge. As if it was some surreal kind of rite of passage she was undertaking a little later than some, the traditional shift from a daddy's-girl to the partner of her chosen companion.

It didn't change the fact that she loved her uncle to pieces, or that he would always be the parent with his name embroidered into the edge of her heart; just that she was…another man's trouble now. A little stone-age to think about, downright archaic and chauvinist, but all truth. It didn't bother her to think about it now, either. Fancy that. Maybe she _had_ grown up in the last few weeks.

The grin he was sending her way was both mischievous and somehow ominous as he mused coolly, "so, when can we expect your boy?"

As well as she knew him, Lilith knew very well that the carefully mild tone her uncle used was a hint of warning. She had suspected this would come sooner or later (and in convenient parallel to her thoughts, quaint enough), his comments leading conveniently into the subject she'd counted on since he had been informed of the existence of the fated _boyfriend._ In fact, she was fairly sure he practiced this bit of speech all night. Being as protective as he had become over the years, she figured if he so much as disapproved of the way her angel dressed, there would be some serious hell to pay for it. And yet as devotedly as she trusted Azrael's repeated reassurances that there would be no conflict, she couldn't prevent her own natural tendency to worry. She just hoped that a quarrel would be avoided…because a fight between her Military Dog of an uncle and her Seraph guardian was not something she really relished the prospect of.

"Um—" she glanced at the clock, acutely reading the numerals that told her it was around 11:23am, and racked her brain at rapid-fire speed for an excuse that would properly explain why she couldn't answer his question. "Well, he's at work right now. And I don't know when he gets off today…"

"What does he do?"

And so it began – the infamous, stereotypical protective male-guardian-driven quizzing initiated by that one simple, follow-through question. Daniel's voice was perfectly calm, but she could tell that he would be critically analyzing and examining every piece of information she gave him to add to his final judgment, for better or for worse. She tried to ignore the intent weight of his gaze upon her face, or at least displace it as her brain worked furiously for ideas until she could swear there was steam leaking out of her ears; finally settling on something that made sense. "He's a teacher—dance teacher. He works at a facility kind of like a prep school for younger students who want to shoot for professional level; conditioning, training, individual work and the like, and he takes classes on the side. That's how we met."

In some practiced way, Daniel managed to look only marginally surprised. Apparently he hadn't been expecting someone artistically inclined, but it didn't shock him either. "Really? I thought Jessica's was a school for girls."

"It is," she confirmed, "but we're collaborating with the boys' school on East River. Adrian's been participating there for a while, taking a break from Bolshoi's methods. Jess partnered us up for this January." Her smile was shy, remembering exactly how that meeting had _really_ taken place, and she looked down at the floor to avoid Daniel's searching look as if he might wheedle the truth out through her eyes. Confound it all, she was blushing. It seemed like half of her life was spent with pink cheeks nowadays, and it was all Azrael's fault. Just thinking about his…unconventional methods of courtship made her insides try to perform acrobatics and her heart to warm.

"You like him, then?"

She rolled her eyes, faintly amused. "_No,_ Uncle Dan—I really hate him, but I'm dating him anyway. Because that makes _perfect _sense." He stuck his tongue out at her, teasingly childish in a moment of humor set aside from his serious quizzing. "Yes, I like him a lot." _I love him more than any words could ever say…_

He seemed to take that well enough, and a thoughtful, ponderous expression replaced the one of petulant half-doubt. "Bolshoi…isn't that the Russian company? _Damn_ good dancers, they are—" Yet no sooner had he begun, he was cut off, looking up to the sound of a soft, rapping knock interrupting him. Suddenly his eyes were bright behind his glasses, anticipating the hunt in the form of an enjoyable few hours to make his precious niece's suitor squirm and sweat. Considering who he was, and his background as a rising star in the Navy before taking up his commission as a scientist, he would probably thoroughly love the ordeal of ripping up the man who had the balls to show interest in his _little girl._ Lilith simply shook her head, steeling herself while getting to her feet and walking (with slightly more dignity this time) down the hall to get the door.

Upon pulling it open, she found herself immediately assaulted by the flash of deep scarlet that was her guardian's simple button-down shirt, half-blinded and partially stricken dumb by the vibrancy of the pure color. Azrael smiled gently down at her from across the threshold, appearing just as he'd promised; his eyes a warm violet, hair tied back in its customary ponytail, coal black sweatshirt draped over his arm, trailing down to the knees of his loose-fitted and slightly worn blue jeans. She stared; vaguely unnerved to see him dressed so very…simply. Without the usual accent of a classy jacket, let alone the underlying sense of finery from these quite normal clothes, the street-wearied Vans he wore in place of his customary black leather, was all a bit of a shock. In any other set of circumstances she would have worried for his sanity, because this was certainly outside of his distinctly foppish outside-character.

Yet while his clothes lacked the flair of eccentricity and glamour they usually held, he looked no worse for it. In fact, the affect of the casual clothing made him seem younger, more like a young man just edging into adulthood rather than one who (despite a youthful face) had been given a great deal more time to settle into a determined look and expression. This was a good thing. It would set Daniel off had Azrael looked too much older. But she didn't know how her uncle would handle the angel's renaissance-shaded personality and ageless, overreaching persona honed with knowledge and inhumanly-crafted wisdom.

"Hello," he murmured, extending one gentle hand and brushing the edge of a single finger down along her cheekbone by way of a more physical greeting. It was a meager touch when compared with what he had given her before and it left Lilith feeling slightly empty, but she understood his reasoning for skimping. In comparison, the unspoken message discernable across his handsome face was soft and open, the word _later_ a silent condolence at his perfect lips as he stepped inside upon her indication.

Her whisper was so low that she could barely hear it herself, keeping quiet enough that she could be positive Daniel wouldn't be able to listen in. But Azrael's inhuman ears would be sharp enough to clearly detect and understand her words. Of that she was certain. "I've told him you're a dance teacher and take classes with me until January. That's all so far."

"Sounds good." He closed the door for her and nudged her lightly back toward the living room. The hall was short, but the way the apartment had been built made it impossible for anyone sitting in the sitting room to see down to the entryway unless they stood and looked around the corner of wall bypassing the kitchen. This was very fortunate, for it kept her uncle from seeing Lilith's steps falter when the angel's fingers traced the seam of her sweater that ran straight down her back, his nails just barely grazing across her spine in what was an obviously affectionate gesture, appreciative as much as examining. "I like this color with your skin."

The musing comment was hushed; barely even a flutter of breath, but she felt the words fan delicate and emotive against the exposed back of her neck. She blushed faintly, her cheeks pink, and ducked her chin, quickly forcing herself to focus on something besides the intense physical pull that rippled and flexed like an electric current between the two of them…at least while her relationship-Nazi of an uncle was in the nearby proximity. His comments were meant to put her at ease, to distract her after undoubtedly sensing she was stressed with the arrangement, but in actuality they just made her even jumpier.

Daniel got to his feet as soon as the pair entered the living room, stepping determinedly forward with his hand outstretched and just a tiny, wolfish edge to his smile. Lilith stood to the side, watching as the two men grasped and shook each other's hand while she introduced, "Uncle, this is Adrian Harker. Adrian, my uncle—Daniel Everett." Her stomach clenched, butterflies of anxiety apparently performing some variation of the salsa while she kept a careful eye on the way Daniel's fingers tightened against Azrael's wrist, taking the given opportunity to demonstrate his fatherly status and feeling with a little show of strength. The man's gaze was pinpointed to the pale angel's face, a hard, calculating look buried steely and watchful deep behind his eyes. Something else was there too, something not so easy to put a name to; a small flicker of unease, or perhaps it was confusion…or recognition…

But Azrael just returned Daniel's smile quite warmly, showing neither intimidation nor surprise to the rather firmer grip than was altogether necessary. In fact, he didn't seem to be fazed by anything, appearing nothing but utterly calm while he greeted politely, "good afternoon, Mr. Everett. It's a pleasure to meet you."

_Ah,_ he was using contractions; clever of him to disguise the normally archaic cadence of his speech to a more modern one.

"Likewise," Daniel replied. A simple response, and one that could have seemed ungracious or even rude to a stranger; but Lilith noticed the very subtle trace of approval that settled across her uncle's tense shoulders. He was pleased by the lack of reaction to his attempted bullying. This was very plain, for Daniel had no respect for a man who couldn't handle a bit of stress and Azrael looked anything but bothered. It was clear to her that the angel's fine, fair looks had been something of a surprise, but also clear that Daniel had just realized that this would be a difficult man to upset.

Taking the brief silence as initiative, Lilith piped up with, "please, sit," and proceeded to flee into the kitchenette to fetch the coffee she had been thinking to make – God knew how much she needed it just then – and keeping her ears open for any hint calling for her to intervene.

Azrael sat as Lilith bade him, taking a place on the couch across from the chair the mortal man occupied, deliberately settling himself within scrutinizing-distance, and gracefully crossed his legs at the knee as he met the other man's gaze with just a shade of inquiring curiosity. This was because Daniel was staring at him as though trying to pierce him through with nothing more than the power of sight, hazel eyes slightly narrowed behind his wire-rimmed glasses. Apparently the older man noticed the silent inquiry and apologized both quickly and uncertainly. "I'm sorry, Adrian—I feel like I've seen you somewhere before," Daniel confessed, his head tilting to a marginally different angle as he examined the pale features of his niece's boyfriend. "But we haven't met, have we?"

"No, sir," Azrael replied, the assenting incline of his head distinctly sage-like, as though he were putting forth the attitude of a man far older than he looked; which he was, in all honesty. And that was the emphasis; _honesty._ There was no lie to his demeanor whatsoever; a direct effort (or perhaps the determined lack of one) to come across as true to his real persona as was possible without seeming too old-fashioned. She considered that for a moment – just how much he was putting into setting up a good relationship with what was left of her family, how truthful he was trying to be despite how difficult it was, and felt her gratitude nearly swelling her heart to extend the capacity of her chest. She hadn't even directly asked him to do this, wouldn't have forced him to, either, yet he'd done it anyway. Had she told him how very much she loved him? "But your involvement with the military in Eastern Europe may have placed you somewhere near my father."

Lilith nearly dropped the coffee cup she was holding, quickly reacting to avoid sloshing hot liquid down her front as she turned, eyes wide, to peer in the direction of the two men over the kitchen counter. Father? Since when did Azrael mention having a _father?_ He only ever spoke of his creator as a feminine entity…did he mean her anyway? Was he dropping a thickly-masked hint?

"A_ha!_ That's it, of course!" Daniel crowed, slapping a palm against his knee. "Andreas Harker! Best damn officer in the whole effing Corps." His hazel eyes fixed to Azrael's face with a sudden, newfound basis of respect, a strange sense of nostalgia lining his expression while he examined the apparently younger male for the second time. "I don't know why I didn't see it; you look just like him…"

Smiled gently, and just slightly sadly, Azrael responded with another nod. "So I've been told. I wish I'd known him long enough to see for myself," he shifted, a kind of physical segway while he looked at Daniel with a somber, placidly accepting edge to his eyes and voice, "he died almost nineteen years ago." And suddenly she understood. He didn't mean an actual father; or even his mother by masculine title. He meant himself…_himself_ before he had stumbled across her as an infant, nineteen years prior to now. The form and name he had taken for an earlier generation, creating a lineage of humans that did not truly exist with the name he had given – Harker; the same as the name recorded in the scrapbook Sarah had shoved under her nose. Perhaps this _Andreas_ was supposedly the descendant of that stern, uniformed figure in the book.

Upon the rising of some deeper, inner instinctual response she felt both saddened and touched; the latter because he seemed to be pressing a positive change in his own life, an enlightening or awakening brought about by the coming of her presence. The earlier because she knew that he didn't like having to lie to her uncle even this marginal amount, no matter how much truth he tried to cram into the fib he was forced to tell. She hadn't seen them together long enough to know for sure, but Azrael seemed to hold a rather large amount of liking and respect for the mortal man…that and he had once told her he disliked the dishonesty he was required to maintain when visible among mortals to keep from starting panic. But he had refused to remain in the shadows, insisting that he come out with as much as he could allow. That in itself was quite admirable.

Realizing with a bit of a start that she had been lingering for far too long over already-made coffee, she plucked her tray from the counter and approached the two men with their drinks. Daniel's thanks was soft and still thoughtful, Azrael's smile warm and vaguely conspiratorial, confirming her suspicion as she sat down beside him on the couch – the careful distance between them making her nervous. She would have preferred to have some margin of contact, even just holding his hand, but knew that her uncle might not take kindly to that just yet. Stupid social code.

"Dead…I'm truly sorry," Daniel's voice was soft, regretful and saddened as he shook his graying head. "He was a true soldier, the kind you can't find nowadays—one of those gallant, chivalrous types. A good man, a good mentor…we all owed him something, whether it was a few bucks' worth of booze, a few letters sent, or even a life."

Pale blond glimmered in the soft sunlight streaming through the unveiled windows as Azrael tilted his face just slightly, his gaze serene and calm as he commented, "I've heard he could be a bit…" he paused, pondered for a moment, and then finished quietly, "difficult."

"Oh, I don't know," the older man shrugged and delicately sipped his coffee. "He was always pretty guarded, seemed to have some emotional trouble, depression or some such. But there was never a better commander anywhere…the man was extraordinary." Daniel's eyes lit with the fondness of a boy speaking of an older brother that he looked up to almost as much as he would a father. "I never knew a man to _feel_ as fiercely as Captain Harker did."

Suddenly apprehensive, Lilith found her fingers inching toward the other end of the couch, nearing Azrael's hand placed casual and still against the upholstery. It was strange to hear her uncle speaking in such a reverent manner about a person he thought to be dead, not to mention a completely separate person from the one sitting right across from him; one that had seemed to touch him so deeply, like the older brother he had tried to be for his own sibling. Perhaps Daniel felt that he had failed in the attempt of brotherhood, that the ties he had made in the military had replaced the ones that had never existed between he and Joseph. A _true_ brotherhood found outside of family – the prime example of what he had wanted to be for his own family. It was clear that he nearly hero-worshipped the man whose training and rule he had served under.

But what if Azrael didn't retain enough of what had made _Andreas_ stand out to Daniel? Or perhaps he retained too much. Would her uncle do as he had threatened and find disapproval? Their hands touched and the angel's last two digits curling around her index finger – a silent offer of calming and comfort. He was not concerned, so she shouldn't be either, no matter how weighty and overbearing the atmosphere felt.

A moment later the grim, grieving mood inside the room seemed to swell into a brighter and more pleasant one as Daniel snapped somewhat awkwardly out of his remembrances. His eyes softened remarkably when he caught sight of his niece's fingers intertwined with those of the pale young man beside her, and the little hint of the smile at his mouth was kindly and accepting. "Well, if you're anything like your father, then I couldn't have picked anyone better myself. I'll certainly sleep more soundly knowing that my little girl has Harker's blood looking after her."

Despite her relief that her uncle wasn't going to threaten with garden-shear castration, Lilith snorted, mildly irked by the implication that she needed to be taken care of. "I'm _not_ a little girl anymore."

"Oh, don't I know it." Daniel sent the silently smiling Azrael a sly wink. "She's sensitive one, touchier than a lamb. Soft and slow will be her style, I think."

A scandalized gasp flew from her mouth as she stared, horrified, at her favorite relative. She had never heard him talk like that before, not ever. Though, if she thought about it, he _was_ still on the young side of forty – and he had always retained a rather suggestive sense of humor. Nevertheless… "_Daniel Everett!_" she hissed, as vehement as if her very moral core had been insulted beyond repair, her glare heated and accented by reddened cheeks. How absolutely and horribly insulting! As if she couldn't manage her love life on her own…but she wasn't going to tell him that her partner didn't need any of the offered information. Azrael already knew that, and much more besides.

"Sorry, sorry!" he lifted his hands in apologetic protection for his own head as he grinned across the way toward the flustered girl. "I couldn't help it! Besides, I know how guys think."

"Perhaps," Azrael interjected softly, his thumb absently tracing the knuckles of the small, feminine hand that curled loosely with his, "or perhaps I've inherited a rather strict amount of self-control." His eyes lightened, flushing with a somber tinge that made the lavender shade take on an almost cloudy blue color as he gave a wry smile. Lilith glanced up at him, her returned smile understanding and sweet, containing deliberate appreciation for his joke. Yes, he certainly had…she had never met anyone with such a firm hold over his own, darker desires before he had come along. Remarkably, for his insistence (and proof toward the point) that he had been driven to the brink of insanity by little more than her scent alone, he had abstained from pressing her, just as he'd continually promised to until the very end. They shared a quiet, mutual moment of connection, warm and content and affectionate – just before Daniel sneezed considerably violently, causing the both of them to turn away from one another to look at him.

Rather alarmed, Lilith half-stood from her seat, her green eyes worried for her relative while he pinched the bridge of his nose in something not far from pain, all earlier annoyance with him completely forgotten. "Are you ok?"

He nodded, releasing his nose with a tentative sniff and assuring, "yeah, just having a bit of a sinus-attack. My nose doesn't approve of the wintry weather." He shrugged with a rather silly smile, "it likes to exact revenge by alternating between running and clogging like a rusty faucet."

Azrael laughed; his voice full and beautiful and pure, absent of the guarded quality it had harbored just a moment ago, apparently feeling much more at ease now that the subject was turned from more sensitive things. "Sounds like quite an ordeal," he said, humored sympathy in his tone as he turned toward Lilith, "do you have any tissues?"

"Tissues won't do any good, son," Daniel commented, "not for lack of trying. If I tried to blow my nose, I'm pretty sure I'd snort half my brains out through my ears."

Lilith had to swiftly press the back of her hand over her mouth to prevent herself from busting into laughter, the mental image she received due to her uncle's over-dramatically distressed confession a rather amusing one. Nevertheless, she stood to go fetch the tissues as Azrael followed her into the kitchen and proceeded to fill a plain ceramic bowl with hot water from the tap. "I believe you," he replied, voice rising to be heard over the running water, "but I think I can help with that."

Setting the box of tissues retrieved from the bathroom on the countertop, Lilith gave him a curious look as he drew a small pouch from his jeans pocket. Seemingly crafted of some kind of oiled cloth, the little container was a soft tan color and – as she saw when he flipped it open – filled with small folded packets of what appeared to be a minute variety of herbs and dried plants. One of these he selected and tore open over the bowl of hot water, dispensing a powder of a dark, leafy green to mix with the liquid. A potent fragrance, pungent and clean, lifted from the herb, and she asked, tone subdued, "what is that?"

"Vervain," he informed her with a lilt of amusement, taking charge of both bowl and tissues as he made to walk back to the living room. "Thanks to Raphael, I now carry a few healing agents with me, including this one." He crossed the floor – Lilith following slightly behind him, curious with the mention of his brother's name – and set the tissues down on the coffee table within arms reach of his patient while holding out the bowl of water-plant mixture. "Now," he instructed, "hold this just under your face and inhale, slowly and deeply."

The bowl changed hands, Daniel's dark and graying eyebrow quirking in obliging curiosity when he lifted the water as he had been told, his head bent slightly, and his face over the hot water as he breathed in deep… And suddenly he coughed; lurching in shock and reflexive panic toward the tissues as Azrael quickly caught the bowl sent askew via the rapid jostle of movement. It was lucky the older man was occupied with his dive for tissues to stop up his now draining nose, for the angel had needed to draw a silent spell in order to prevent the stained water from sloshing over the sides of the bowl and onto the clean white carpet. "God_damn!_" the oath was muffled by a rather generous load of tissue as Daniel voiced it, his eyes now focused on Azrael's pale face with a great deal of wonder. "Where did you learn that? And what kind of plant was that, incidentally, it cleared my sinuses in about a _second…_"

Nodding with satisfaction and setting down the bowl, Azrael he answered softly, "I have allergies; a colleague of mine knows a thing or two about herb usage and taught me a few tricks. The plant's a foreign one."

Amused, and quite impressed with Azrael's useful talent for being quick with his words, Lilith took the bowl from him and turned back to the kitchen with the intent to start working on dinner. When he made to stand, rolling up his shirtsleeves as if to help, she shooed him away with a wave of her hand, appreciating the offer nonetheless. He smiled meekly, doing as she told him and returning to the couch as her uncle pressed him for information regarding this _colleague_ of his – truly his older brother. He was speaking sparingly, though he didn't seem guarded, and she could tell that he was somewhat disturbed to be pulling the information so stiffly between truth and falsehood. It almost seemed to pain him to be unable to trust Daniel with the entire truth about himself; no doubt he was taking it to a personal level.

Well, that was understandable; she knew, in his place, _she_ would be very upset about having to lie (if only briefly) to his parent or guardian. Of course, if she could even look his mother in the eyes…well, it wasn't likely to happen. God wasn't about to take any interest in speaking to someone like bashful, mousey little Lilith.

With a quiet sigh, she buried herself in her recipe, leaving the men to their discussion. More like leaving Daniel to try and pull a bit of anxiety out of the man who posed as his niece's infatuate. But she didn't worry so much now; Azrael could take care of himself, and she had no doubt that the pale angel would handle her uncle with spectacular ease. Due to his age and his level of experience in dealing with people (difficult or otherwise) he was probably more qualified than she was, which was why she felt no guilt for having ordered him to sit through the interrogation.

Now that she thought about it, she didn't know who she pitied more…he who was being quizzed, or he who was doing the quizzing.

* * *

"So, Adrian," Daniel let his attention shift from Lilith, busy fussing with what seemed to be a good-sized roast in the kitchenette, to the handsome young man sitting across from him. "How old are you, anyway? Your dad never mentioned having kids."

Azrael's expression was calm, open and serene. He didn't question the abrupt and what could have been considered slightly personal inquiry, but answered softly, "he didn't know I existed. I was born three years before he died of tuberculosis, and since he was in Europe at the time, mother couldn't get a notice to him." At the surprised look on Daniel's face, he smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry, she's fine. She misses him, I think, but I never knew him so I don't actually mind all that much. And to answer your question, I'll be twenty-two this upcoming January."

A nod was the reply used to display he'd heard, yet the military scientist looked a little alarmed by the knowledge that the man he had looked up to for so many years had died in such a gruesome manner. Tuberculosis was not a pretty illness…and it was painful, that much he knew. No wonder Andreas had always looked so peaky, he'd been sick. All the same, that poor woman – the man had surely left behind a devoted wife alongside the child who had never known him. It was sad, he wasn't cold enough to ignore it, but the story wouldn't drag him from his purpose in interrogating the young man who vied for his precious niece's affections. The lineage from which he came was respectable, that was definite, but there was a chance of fall-outs in every family; and Daniel wanted to be sure that this child retained enough of his father's blood to put him at ease. He wasn't going to hand Lilith over to just _any _boy who asked. The kid would have to be nearly a clone of his parent to pass his tests.

"Good," he smiled pleasantly, "you're not too old." The grin he offered was returned with one that was almost painful to look at, it was so beautiful. Lord almighty, the boy was handsome…he could understand why Lilith liked him so much. That in itself was a problem; kids like this were often arrogant and entirely too comfortable with their own charms. "And how many other girls have you been involved with lately?" A thin, pale golden eyebrow quirked in response, smile fading just the slightest amount at the edges of a fine mouth, and Daniel felt a surge of victory uncoil within his chest. Ah, here was the weak place, then – so the boy didn't like this question? But no…that wasn't right. In the place of nervousness or fear there was _indignation._

"How long a time period?" the request for details was tinged with sarcasm; sharp, bitter, almost angry. "The past few months? The past year?" Offense…_that_ was what the edginess represented. In a smooth, slippery instant the boy seemed as tense as a drawn bowstring, strange purple eyes hard and glittering with dangerous insult. No longer did he seem to be a boy just stepping over the line between adolescence and adulthood, but someone much older, wiser, and with great power. He seemed…not quite human anymore, pride and dignity flaring into brilliant life as his expression bordered on the steely edge of a glare. But he calmed almost immediately, shaking his pale head and speaking quietly while running a hand over his face. "I'm sorry, sir, I lost my temper. The answer is one."

"In the past year?" This was spoken with some trepidation, slightly worried that he might offend the boy again. For some reason, he wanted to avoid that – provoking the kid into a nervous sweat he had no qualms with, but Daniel was not keen on angering the son of a man who had been a vicious and merciless fighter in life.

The boy remained rather expressionless, features smooth and vapid, but a sense of incredible sadness came over him, curling and dark as a gray storm cloud as he clarified: "no. I've only ever had one other."

Skeptical surprise was an evident response and Daniel quickly suppressed a snort of disbelief, crossing his arms across his chest. "Really…" He looked the pale young man up and down. No, there was little chance that statement could be true. The kid was a ready-made girl-magnet, with his looks he could have gotten any woman he wanted (including some that he probably didn't want). Younger, older, or otherwise, with just a little work; he had the looks and the natural, genteel charm that could draw in anyone he chose to direct it toward – Daniel had no doubts about that.

Yet, as if sensing the disbelief like a scent upon the air, a coy smile of humor twitched into being upon Azrael's firm, expressive lips along with the slight incline of his head to show he understood. "I know you don't believe me. Yes, it sounds ridiculous, but I can't help being a romantic at heart. And she hurt me…pretty badly." His countenance stiffened, sharpening with suppressed memory that seemed to pain him. "I never made it my intention to go looking for anyone else to fill the void, I just devoted myself to my work to try and push the emptiness out—not that it worked. I was single for a long time before I ran into Lilith."

Violet flashed bright for a moment; and in that split second of color, Daniel could have sworn on his own departed mother's grave that the boy's eyes had gone from that darker purple to an eerie, pale lavender. But surely that was impossible… Even with this little piece of oddity to distract him, Daniel could still sense the touchiness of the subject at hand. The boy was not keen on sharing information about his previous love affair – and from what he could see and hear Daniel could understand why. There was great pain and a sense of long, conflicted time within Adrian's voice; and that was something he, as a fellow man and one who had faced a similar kind of emotional hurt, could respect.

He gracefully took hold of the offered subject-change to pose yet another question. This was a different one from the rest and possibly the most important yet. As such, it was also probably the most difficult to handle. "I hope you won't mind me asking," he watched the young man's face carefully for any sign of discomfort, panic, or annoyance, "what is it about my niece that you like?" And yet, to his immense amazement (since this was the question that had made _him_ sweat bullets in his teenage years), the boy's posture visibly relaxed.

"I don't mind in the least. If I were a father, I'd ask the same thing…and it's an easy enough question to answer." He shifted in his seat, uncrossing his legs and leaning marginally forward as though in effort to keep Lilith from overhearing; though she really wasn't paying any attention to them. "I'm not going to lie and say that it has nothing to do with her looks, because that's not being honest. She _is_ lovely, and I'd be a fool not to see it—but that alone is not enough to keep my attention." Sighing gently, violet eyes slipping closed for a moment, he added, "I think it's her strength. She doesn't realize just how much of a right she has to be completely anti-social and yet she isn't. Through every blow, she still manages to be pleasant, she still tries…I greatly admire that quality."

The boy's eyes darkened, shading with what seemed to be a hint of blue as he turned his head to glance at the young woman fussing with her noodle salad in the apartment's tiny kitchen, the already softened expression growing softer still as he looked at her with gentle eyes. "She fascinates me, inspires me…and even despite everything I was taught, I think I would do just about anything to see her smile."

Daniel watched the boy sitting across from him with a deep-set sense of interest, hazel, bespectacled eyes keen with silent observation; watching the young man who, in turn, watched the woman busy in her kitchen. Lilith looked up then, glancing toward the two men in her living room, and met the piercing eyes of the blond. Her lips lifted, a quiet smile accenting her soft mouth as her sweet, pretty face seemed to light up with the glow of absolute adoration, a beautiful ease and careless peace that reflected a mood filtered with nothing but serenity, belonging, and devotion shared between two equal parties. Everything about her gentled and opened up, the stubborn, self-reliant, independent little lady she'd turned herself into immediately sliding to adopt something else warmer and tender. It was something inside every woman, but locked away, guarded, something that took just the right touch to release it and display it to the rest of the world.

The violet-eyed youth returned the smile, pleased somehow, and calmed even more by the silent grace she had given him, a moment of connection that stretched for a long moment full of everything and simple nothing all at once. A scattering of words popped unbidden into the older man's head, the old saying alerting him to notice something that he had not before; and it didn't matter that he'd been without sight of his niece for the past few years; he noticed the change inside her just the same. With that realization, a smile of his own lifted to join the other two, the hard lines of care and remaining suspicion easing as he murmured softly, "I think I understand."

Lilith looked up again, calling the men to help her set out the early dinner with a second bright, bewitching smile, her innocent, flowery kind of beauty suddenly unmatched by even the afternoon sunlight streaming in through the wide living room window. Azrael rose gracefully from the couch to join her in the kitchen, his hand gently resting against her slight, delicate shoulder. He leant over her, somehow protective and doting, and touched a soft, affectionate kiss to the slope of her cheek – unconcerned by the alert watch of the girl's uncle. Her smile widened, one slender hand lifting to touch carrot-stained fingertips against his wrist, leaning into the touch and coolly chastising him for being inappropriate before swatting at him with her potholder.

As he watched the fond, affectionately-playful scene, the boy bravely assisting Lilith in extracting the finished roast from the oven and was handed a carving knife with a distinct peal of giggling when violet eyes grew wide upon the indication he should cut; the older man felt his worried heart beating without fear for his niece's safety for the first time in many years. For, yes indeed, this one would take good care of her. After all; a man didn't love a woman because she was beautiful, she was beautiful because he loved her.

* * *

**Greetings! :D So sorry for the freakin wait, guys it took me a while to figure out how I wanted to edit the beginning of this chapter, and then to get inspired to go through the rest of it. Blah. I have a horrible work ethic. I apologize most fervently. But I hope this was worth the wait at least a little bit.**

**Hello to Mr. Everett! He's a military scientist who was stationed somewhere in Europe for the majority of Lili's life (not sure where yet...I almost want to say Denmark, but m'not positive), doing what, I have no idea. But as with most of the military, he had to do some training crap, like any newbie, when he was young...and yes, hello new little interesting history segment. Wut, Azrael knew Daniel when he was a young idiot? :O wai yes! Also, I can't for the life of me find it, if I said "Navy" anywhere, it's supposed to be the Marines - -; tyyyyyyyyyyyyypo. Anyway, that'll come into play again later on, but not for a while, as with his character.**

**Also, I totally bull-shitted the wine bit. Just a disclaimer. Harhar... **

**And another few notes to reply to some readers: **

**- I can't exactly go into detail, but we haven't seen the very last of Malik. Or Nisroc for that matter, but she's not as important. Just you wait 'till volume 2. Hoo boy.  
- I realize the little phone/strip-tease thing might have seemed out of character for Azrael. All I'm going to say is that we really don't know him that well yet. Lilith does, surprisingly, but she's got her reasons - not all of them rational. He can be quite...forceful sometimes.  
- If it was confusing in chapter 49 (the intesely-lovey chapter), Azrael reworked his shallower locating spells into protective ones, which also tend to give an outward sense of ownership and prevent any repeats of the bloodworking magic used to hide her from him.**

**TO ALL YOU GHOST-READERS! I love you all very dearly, but please try to review every once in a while so I can love you even more. It seriously affects my productivity. No joke.**

**And to everyone reading, my sincere gratitude for hanging on this long, and for showing interest in the entirety of what's going to be a very copiously and ridiculously epic story :3 thank you so much for your patience and your love.**

**see you next time!**


	34. Silver Shadow Believer

**Chapter 52: Silver Shadow Believer**

Recommended Listening: "Christophori's Dream" by David Lanz

* * *

With a long, breathy sigh, he leaned back against the wall of the entry hallway, tipping his head backward and lamenting softly, "that went well." A whisper of quiet, a soft remark of mild, nonchalant amusement.

Lilith glanced back over her shoulder at him as she shut the door to the apartment, turning to flash a coyly skeptical grin his way after she finished bidding Daniel good night with a wave. Her uncle had decided to leave soon after dinner, regretfully stating that he had work in the morning and still more boxes to unpack; but he had granted Azrael a significantly approving look just before hugging his only niece and taking his leave – bottle of wine tucked appreciatively and securely under his arm. Throughout the meal the angel had remained effortlessly oblivious to any lingering discomfort, joining in on the pleasant, conversational chatter between the two Everetts with mild enjoyment and making no movement to indicate that he felt any pressure at all…probably because he hadn't felt any. The expressing relief was purely for her benefit and she knew it. "Oh right, as if you were nervous!"

His smile was crooked, his eyes glowing, a soft smolder with violet stars as he reached out to stroke the tip of one finger down the bridge of her nose. "Not really, no."

She shifted to stand before him, stepping onto her tip-toes to make herself a bit taller while her arms slid around his neck, slender fingers twining in his hair as she tugged the silken strands free from the restraining tie. He followed her, his warm flesh curling around her waist, a gentle cradle of iron strength gone soft, and his hands lightly resting against the small of her slender back. "Because of your aged wisdom and years and years of experience, no doubt," was her joke, and she was only _half_ teasing. For beneath the playful exterior of the remark lay an uncertain amount of resentment, partially furious with him for having been so calm and collected while staring in the face of interrogation when she had wanted to fall out of her chair and promptly start seizuring with fits of anxiety.

His grip tightened around her waist, pressing her comfortably to his chest and resting his cheek against the crown of her head. "Not so much experience, really…just observation—and I know Daniel anyway, though I highly doubt he will make that connection now. It was not so difficult to convince him that I am the son of the man he thought he knew."

"So you _did_ mean that," she confirmed softly, referring to the hypothesis she had made relating to the personality change he had experienced after he had found her; the way he had spoken as though his _father_ had merely been himself before discovering the lift he needed to find his way out of the depths of personal depression. The idea had been halfhearted at first; unsure if she was reading him correctly, but now she was fairly certain.

"You know I did."

Her face lifted, brushing her forehead against his while the tips of their noses touched, looking into eyes that swirled from reminiscent lavender to a tender shade of blue-violet. "Thank you for doing this," she murmured, softly stroking the nape of his neck with her fingertips as if trying to physically relay her gratitude. "I know you don't like having to mask who you are—"

"Shh," he interrupted smoothly, a soft smile gracing his lovely lips, "say no more. I do not like it, but you are more than worth it. So is Daniel. He deserves as much of the truth I can give him, even if I cannot give him the entirety."

A soft sigh slid from her throat, the length of her finger tracing along the arcing line of his jaw as she returned his smile with a lighthearted one of her own. "Well, if it's any consolation to the nasty bit, you did an amazing job handling him. I've heard things about what he's done to some of his trainees as far as intimidation goes, and it isn't pretty."

Laughter lifted the air, his warm voice easing the sad sympathy she felt for her partner as he laughed out loud. "And where do you think he learned how to do that?" he questioned with a wink, "not from the Corps, I can tell you that much. He was a quick learner, hot-tempered too, until the officers worked that out of him—but he was always rather tolerant in my sessions. Probably because he knew I could teach him how to poison whoever he wanted without even having to walk to the store for chemicals." He chuckled, genially amused. But then he suddenly stopped, giving her a look lined with the cares of worry, porcelain brow slightly furrowed, "I am sorry, does it bother you to hear this?"

"Not at all," she reassured him with a shake of her head, "it's actually rather fascinating. I've learned a lot from your experience and that only comes from age. It's interesting to hear about Dan when he was younger. He wasn't around very often, so I don't really know that much. And I never knew he'd known…_Andreas_ until tonight." Slight shoulders shrugged, the lilt of her smile both appreciative and genuinely interested until she added, "oh, and if you're wondering—no, I'm not going to sit down on day, think about how old you really are and freak out." Patting his cheek with a soft hand, her laughter spilled light and sparkling from her eyes, "I don't think you're a pedophile or have a Lolita complex or anything ridiculous like that."

He snorted, but his tone lacked both irony and sarcasm when he replied rather dryly, "you know, I did wonder about that once. You were so young—I thought I was losing my mind," his lips lifted in a dazzling, charm-rich smile; one of those gracious expressions of such beauty that it probably could have stopped the breath of a woman across the span of three whole rooms. "When in fact, I was really losing my heart."

Lilith couldn't help the giggles that bubbled from her lungs and ultimately had to press her face into the crook of his neck to hide from his eyes in an attempt to stop. "Oh, now _that_ was _cheesy,_" she said between her laughter, inhaling the warm, musky scent of him as she buried her nose in the front of his shirt.

"Yes, it was rather pathetic, was it not?" He laughed too, the rumble from his chest a gentle vibration against her cheek. But the expression of mirth died not even a moment later, replaced by a cool silence that stretched long and still and wreathed in discomfort, until he broke it with a slow, slightly hesitant comment. "But in all seriousness, I really did worry about my attraction to you at first."

"Why?"

An almost defensively repressing gesture, his hands shifted, thumbs tucking into the back pockets of her slacks to loosely cup her rear end with his palms. It seemed to be a method of keeping her there, sheltered against his larger body, as though he thought she might find whatever the answer was to be unpleasant, as though he thoughts she might try to pull away from him. Voice a little faint, a little muted in its usual color, he answered, "because I did not want to find myself manipulating you into thinking yourself in love with me just to satisfy some animal instinct I could not control."

She yanked her head back so quickly that she almost stumbled from knocking her own balance off, and surely would have if not for the sturdy hold of his arms to support her. "Don't you dare think that," she said sternly, suddenly raw and demanding, an order formed from the backlash reflex of horror from the implication and her voice lodging in her throat as she stared up at him, absolutely serious. Her chin lifted, stubborn with refusal to accept such an atrocious claim. Catching his face between her fragile hands, she looked him directly in the eyes, doing her darndest to assert sureness and determination, and pressed, "you did nothing of the sort…I am _not_ manipulated. I love you because I want it that way, not just because you wished for it." Then, almost as suddenly as it had surged to life, her power was gone. Her strength faded as she seemed to wilt like an unhappy flower, palms sliding down his neck to his chest as her eyes closed and her head tipped forward to rest against the curve of his collarbone. "_I_ love you. I _do._" So certain, so quickly.

"I know, Sweetling," he murmured, the tone soothing, his touch delicate and comforting as he fussed with the task of removing the ties and bobby pins from her dark hair so that it was released from the knot to spill down her back in soft waves of deep brown. Chastised, he cursed himself for having upset her so.

But it was true; he _had_ been concerned.

She had been so very young – _fourteen,_ not even having reached the age of adulthood as it was considered in the _mortal _world, let alone the immortal ones…and he was so, _so_ much older than she. Her joke about complexes hadn't been out of line in the least. His own cynical thoughts had often wandered in such a direction, fretting that he was reacting to an overload of pressure and quite possibly going mad. How could he have been so depraved as to lust after a girl whose only proof that she was beyond childhood was the blood left behind on the sanitary napkins she used upon the newfound call of the moon? How could he have allowed himself to return day after day, night after night, to watch her as she worked, danced, ate, slept…acting like some kind of addict, when in reality, that was exactly was hewas. An addict.

Every part of her had the disorienting, hallucinogenic properties of a drug, the natural, defining smell of her skin alone able to kick his normally sensible mind to places he never would have imagined could exist. He was an angel! He wasn't supposed to react this way, and not to such a young, helpless little thing. Lolita Complex…as if he hadn't thought of that before. He had scoffed at Nabokov's work when the man had been writing it – oh, but he knew better now, and felt that he should have bit his tongue when teasing the author's soul about the book. He – Azrael, the lord of death, right hand of God, complete master of himself and his immediate environment – had fared no better when faced with the brunt allure of that poor girl than a human teenage boy.

Yet he had gradually begun to accept that age was an unfair barrier to keep, and it hardly mattered now if she was consciously making the decision to come to him of her own free will. He had once worried about distracting her from any one of the mortal men that might have been better for her, but that philosophy too had collapsed in upon itself when he had ceased to care any further. In taking care of her for so long he had come too far to back graciously away and allow anyone else near enough to form that kind of bond with her – and her acceptance had only made his determination to keep her that much more solid.

To claim that he had been completely honorable from the beginning would have been a bold-faced lie, because he had been greedy, lusting, possessive, vain, and all-out wrathful on more than one occasion. But somehow he had avoided punishment simply for the fact that he couldn't help any of it. Something so beyond his control that every slice of the torment, seeing her, hearing her voice ebb and flow as she laughed with her friends at lunchtime, feeling the brush of her eyes on his face, the breathy, tentative touch of the kiss she had asked him for that night in the park – vulnerable and addled by fear and gratitude mingled heady and overpowering – all of it. He wasn't quite sure how he had managed to win her heart so fast, after all he was fairly certain he'd proved just how dangerous a connection to him could be. But he knew it was an honest victory. If she had been lying, he would have known it. If it had been his own influence…he would never have had the will.

Not without the bile of madness. And if it had come to that…he didn't really want to consider it, especially not now that he was positive she wasn't going to let what was left of his sanity slip through her fingers.

He hushed her softly, "_ruueh,_ I know you do," rubbing one hand tenderly up and down her back, "I had never once thought of doing such a thing, I would be too cowardly to try. Besides," he whispered, cradling her close to his body, sheltering her protectively against his chest, "I fell in love with the timid little mouse I saw because I hoped I could help her to see that the world was not the cruel place she thought it was. I wanted to prove to her that I could show her something good."

Delicate and doting, her lips brushed against his chin, the soft graze of a kiss to his skin as her fingers gripped the material that draped his torso, her voice smooth, sure, and quiet, she whispered back, "I think you might be succeeding, handsome." She only flushed a little, realizing that it was the first time she'd addressed him with any kind of pet-name or pseudonym. Apparently, he'd noticed too.

Deep within his chest, he could almost literally feel his heart swelling with pride and love and gratitude to the woman nestled in his arms. She _was_ young, but still she was so strong, even if she couldn't see it that way. Her voice came calmly and with such relaxed comfort; that loose, casual tenderness and affection that could cool even the rage of his vicious (though hard to come-by) temper. He knew that she couldn't possibly know how much hearing her talk like that helped him…but then again, perhaps she did. Perhaps she felt the very same kind of solace when he spoke to her, and perhaps that was something to bring them closer – appreciation for the respectful, understanding devotion they gave one another. They supported each other; his physical power holding her up, and her emotional capacity serving as his grounding, keeping one another firmly in place as they walked along down the winding road of time.

He was so very proud of her; only a few short weeks and she had come so far, already he could feel the rends in his heart closing up and resealing. Neither of them had thought the other would be willing to have a damaged partner, but in truth they were both injured to such an extent that it was the simple matter of being in one another's presence that allowed them to heal. Azrael knew very well that he had risked a great deal more than his life by chancing himself on her ability to accept him, but he also knew that he had had more faith in her than he had ever given himself the permission to see. She had always willing, somewhere hidden, deep down inside herself where her girlhood dreams and hopes had lain dormant and half forgotten; he had simply needed to show her the right path.

She was slipping away, gently disentangling herself from his grip and he let her do so, trailing after her while she padded quietly into the kitchen to finish cleaning up the dinner mess. The dishes were cleared from the table already, lining the counter like a mass of figurative corpses after being set at by vultures (a rather dreary way to look at it, he mused); the remains of a thoroughly enjoyed meal. He took it upon himself to take care of the leftover food while she fussed with the dishwasher, adjusting and readjusting the load to cram in the maximum number of soiled dishes she could manage. Bowls and plates and serving spoons were emptied and set out for her after his quick hands scraped the leftovers into plastic containers to be slid into the fridge. She sent him a grateful smile over one shoulder, the tilt of her head emphasizing the sleek line of her neck before turning back to the sink filled with hot, sudsy water and a scrubbing pad.

Once finished with the food, he joined her, standing to her right with his hands ready for rinsing and a dishtowel slung over his shoulder to dry. Her muffled laughter made him smile, admitting with a little half-shrug that he probably looked rather silly with soap bubbles on his hands and the towel, very domestic…which had never really been a word he'd have used to describe himself. She neither addressed it nor argued, but merely accepted his offer and handed over the platter she had been liberally scrubbing at with the ferocity of a drill sergeant with her tiny fingers. They always looked so fragile, her small, slender hands, but she was stronger than she looked.

If only she knew how to use that strength properly, she might never have needed him to begin with—

"There's something I need to tell you."

He paused, calm violet gaze briefly shifting to lance her way before setting to the newly rinsed plate with his towel. The note of grim austerity laden under the quiet lift of speech had been a little disconcerting, in a sudden, unprepared way – not that he was concerned, necessarily, not yet, in any case; but such tones usually brought tidings of an unpleasant nature. Perhaps she was worried about something? "Yes?" he invited softly, careful to keep his voice light and delicate to avoid pressuring her into not wanting to speak again.

Brow slightly furrowed, she worried at her lip with her teeth, and then realized she was doing it and stopped. Steeling herself, she threw caution to the winds and charged on without allowing the little fretting pricks of inner doubt to hold her back. "It's just—I wanted to apologize." Again his movement stilled for a tiny breath, powerful hands briefly motionless before finishing with the plate and setting it aside, laying the towel down against the counter and reaching for the next soapy dish she placed in his half of the sink. It was a subtle, silent question, left unvoiced to avoid interrupting her, but obvious enough that she knew it was there. _What about? _He was asking. "Because..." she frowned, a little flustered, down at the serving bowl half submerged in bubble-heavy water, "well—because…" Darn it, why couldn't she say it?

"Because?" He prompted softly, resting his bared forearms against the stainless steel rim of the sink.

And just like that, a rush of all the guilt and feeling and sympathy and regret poured out of her, released from the clutching reserves of her inner sanctum as if she simply couldn't hold on to the deluge any more. Hands scraping brutally at the dish, eyes focused completely on the task, stubborn jaw set, she let it all out – every scrap of turmoil that had been eating at her since she'd begun to doubt, ever since she'd found herself challenged by the pale-haired stranger on the street.

"You know I only dated Kevin because I felt obligated?" She laughed, the sound a little too hard for her voice. "I don't even remember why I, maybe because Sarah was so hopeful, and because he acted nice at least when we were together, and his little flaws weren't unbearable. It's like I was tired of being stubborn. Or maybe I just wanted a boyfriend more than I always said I did—more than I thought I did." The bowl went into the other compartment of the sink, the larger portion of the in-set basin separated by a thick lip of steel, slippery and wet, and she groped for the next dish to scour clean. "And how I've always been preaching about how bad sex is and how wrong and dirty and…did you know I have no idea why I do? Other than being afraid of men, it never really made sense. And now I _know_ it's not bad, but it still scares me to think about being with…anyone…else."

The outburst slowly faded, replaced by the sound of running water while he rinsed, absolutely silent, somehow aware that she wasn't quite finished. Though her cheeks were a little flushed, a tiny trace of embarrassment leftover from more innocent days, because it took a while for the psyche to make the progression, he knew better than to show pride or pleasure from the admission. It was flattering, of course it was, but there was more to this little spiel than a confession she had already (at least in part) given.

"It doesn't make sense…it never really did—maybe that's why I always felt so guilty whenever I'd push you away." The pace of her scrubbing eased a little bit. "I think I knew, a little, that you were right. I think that's why every time you tried to help I'd get all defensive and nasty, because I didn't want to hear it, even if I already knew it was the truth. Because I was stupid and pig-headed and too afraid to even _try._"

Still, he remained quiet, wordlessly holding out a hand for the next soapy dish. But she didn't give it to him.

With a heavy sigh, she stopped her cleaning altogether, lifting her face to look at the shiny black surface of the microwave in front of them, not truly seeing, and not truly caring either. "You were right," she said, and it seemed to slip from her mouth with a weight of relief, "you were right about everything. I don't know how much pain I put you through, or how frustrating or infuriating I must have been…actually I'm amazed you didn't just throttle me," a tiny laugh, just slightly awkward for the attempt to ease the brashness of the statement, "but I'm sorry. I'm sorry for being difficult, I'm sorry for hurting you—I never really wanted to. And I'm sorry for not figuring it out sooner."

For a moment she deliberated, almost as though there was more she wanted to say, and it was a moment forged of weighty silence that felt somehow softer than before. An edge had lingered to their relationship, constantly reshaping as it was, an issue left unfinished, things left unsaid. Psychologically, he'd known it was there, but emotionally it hadn't made much of a difference because action and behavior had always spoken to him louder and more clearly than her older words had. It made sense that she wouldn't want to let it rest, even if they'd already moved past it. It wasn't sitting well with her; she saw it as a wrong she felt she had to right, mistreatment that she'd had no right or reason to lay on him. When she peered up at him and he met her look directly, he could read the guilt in her face almost as much as he could feel it clouding her aura with bitterness.

"It was never a sin to fear," he told her softly, taking the dish from her hands and smoothing the soap residue away with a quiet trickle of fresh water. "It was part of who you were, just as another girl might have unreasonably feared spiders, and like you fear heights as well. I saw no reason to make it a larger problem than it already was by trying to crush it, just…help you see it through another light." Taking the towel, he wiped the thin slough of clear liquid from the bowl's surface and set it down with a muted chink of ceramic to ceramic. "There is nothing to forgive, really. I should have been more patient with you by far, should have given you more time to ask questions, and should not have been so defensive, myself."

"It's not your fault I—" she hushed herself, bidding him to continue with a gesture from a sudsy hand.

He smiled and took that hand, fingers wrapping loosely around the edge of her palm and wrist. "I pushed you hard—very hard. Harder than I should have allowed. Half of the…arguments we had were directed poorly because I was so determined to change your mind, and I drove you into corners more harshly than was altogether necessary." In his mind he could almost see the incidents play through, her fury and confusion and hurt, sometimes even pain after yanking away from him had caused her to hit her head. A smile curved at the corner of her mouth, and he could tell she was remembering too, and not with recalled insult or anger, either. "The way I see it," he continued, "you handled me quite expertly, and you never let me walk over you."

She blushed, "I can think of a few times…"

"Bah," he jerked his head, "kisses are different. I was cheating."

"Oh, so you admit it, now?" she teased, nudging him gently with her shoulder and flashing him a warm grin while taking the last of the dishes and wiping them clean. The silverware was easiest to take care of, but sadly still required two hands, making her give his hand an affectionate squeeze before letting go. "About time you took responsibility for ruining me!"

Leaning over, his laughter soft and warm in her ear, he let his lips brush against the little space behind the meeting of jaw of neck, a tender little kiss to emphasize the murmured reply of, "for other men, maybe."

Handing him the freshly cleaned and soapy silverware, she laid her head against the curve of his shoulder. "Does that mean you forgive me?"

"Did I not just say there was nothing _to_ forgive?"

"_Azrael…?_" she whined pitifully, exaggeratedly exasperated in the beseeching rise of her voice as he calmly rinsed and dried the various assortment of forks and steak knives.

"Yes, dear?"

Pouting as she glowered at him, eyes following while he meandered back and forth through her kitchen putting dried dishes away, she retorted, "answer the question!"

"If I must," he sighed dramatically, eyeing her with a light of strange sympathy to shift the color of his eyes. Fleetingly, she thought he wasn't going to do it, he remained quiet for longer than she'd hoped. But with a mild click of his tongue and a shallow flick at her rear with the end of the twisted towel, he conceded obligingly, "yes, _eve,_ I forgive you."

There was something she could have said, something she impulsively wanted to, but decided they would both be better off without. _I don't deserve it, _would just distress him. And that, in turn, would lead to some great, never-ending tirade on how they didn't deserve each other – which would come, she was sure, because she knew him well enough now to know that he felt the same way. She supposed that was fair. In the matter of insecurity, at least, they were evenly matched.

Part of her wondered if he was truly taking her seriously or if he'd disregarded the whole thing to be trivial feminine fretting without much of a merit to it (well, that wasn't quite the way she imagined he pictured it, but she wasn't sure how else it would be described). The short measure of distance flickering behind his eyes was odd, a fleeting edge of something cold and uncertain. She dried her hands while the water drained from the sink, wondering vaguely whether she had made a mistake in confessing to him – the long, drawn-out spill of inner stress and worry that was so convoluted and inconsequential now – ashamed as she had been for her need to patch up the aftertaste of misunderstanding. Her_ own_ misunderstanding, it seemed. No, that was silly. He probably just had something else on his mind.

She squeaked when he caught her by the arm, swinging her gracefully around to face him again. "Come dance with me," he entreated quietly, the palm of his hand cupping her elbow as he pushed backward to tow her patiently into the living room.

She laughed softly, the little spark of concern smoothing instantly away like a wrinkle from fabric under the pursuit of companionship. "What—here, now?" But she didn't pull away, merely followed the direction of his movement to join him in the small, empty stretch of floor spanning the distance between dining and living room. The touch of his fingers slid down her forearm in a long, brushing line to catch her hand, and with a graceful extension of momentum he led her into a gentle twirl under his arm. So like a casual Swing move, and so oddly sweet, that it made her giggle.

His smile was tender and tinged with humor. "Why not?" The hands taking her waist and initiating the slow, easy pattern of a simple waltz-step were warm, taking in the heat from beneath her skin and mirroring it back to her through his; it was nice, rather than the chill of marble he could sometimes become. He was humming gently, quiet and thrumming against her cheek, almost under his breath although she could hear the twining melody spiraling almost as if from far away – strangely reminiscent of a solo pianist's effort. Simply finding that she might as well play along with his whim, she allowed the beauty of the music to flow through her head, her arms loosely twining around his torso and her head pillowed against the sloping muscle of his chest.

"What is this song?" She questioned absently, "I've never heard it before, and it doesn't sound…heavenly?"

The vibration of his quiet laughter interrupted the music, for which she was a little sad, though it didn't seem to cease all the way. As if a piece of her brain was tuned to his like a radio channel, the faint lull of the sound echoing inside her head even without his voice to direct it with notes versus the words he offered instead. "It is called _Christophori's Dream;_ a composition by a man named David Lanz in regards to the invention process of the piano. I am rather fond of it."

That explained the pianist vibes nicely. She smiled; a dreamy, drowsy kind of expression as she allowed him complete control over her steps in the sway of the casual dance. Her body followed blindly with closed eyes and shadowed attention to the movement guided by his hold around her waist, curled around him like a blanket of flesh that was just a little too small to be of significant use, but affectionate enough so that it didn't matter. "I can tell. Because you play?"

"Partly."

The silence fell smoothly, light and floating, the mood rather reminiscent of a downy fall of snow, and after a moment passed and no reply came from her lips, he resumed his humming. A little more defined this time, the melody rose and fell like breath, filmy and delicate and trickling like rain to slide down her hearing and soothe her soul. Tilting her head upward just a tiny fraction, she rubbed her nose against the V of skin displayed by the two undone buttons in his shirt front, filling her lungs with the clean, musky scent of him, enjoying the closeness with which he held her. The mixture of cradle and embrace tucked her sweetly against his taller frame, the lean, powerful build fitting neatly to her softer, curved body like a god-intended match had been made with their contrast. Which could very well be true, she supposed before a heavy yawn interrupted her lazy line of thought.

Her eyes slid open, the fingers of one wayward hand idly toying with the first of the buttons left fastened, the little closure a smooth bit of texture to the fabric of the garment itself. With a quiet hiccup of laughter, she inquired, "is it bad for me to be so tired?"

Azrael's embrace turned deliciously tight, surrounding her with comfort and support, doting and loving and full of his warmth to make her feel even more drowsy and contented. "Not in the slightest. You have had a difficult week; you are entitled to be weary."

She laughed again, this time with an edge of coy amusement, "not all of it was difficult. There were parts I rather enjoyed, if you know what I mean." Her fingers slid the button from its place with a twisting flourish, the material slipping free to lengthen the gap in the cloth displaying his flesh by another two inches, and she let the tips of her nails trace a light, curving line from the hollow of his throat down between the edges of the smooth ivory muscles of his chest. The surface shifted beneath her touch, a light tremor of approval that matched the readjustment of the hands at her waist which pressed her closer still.

But when his lips brushed against the part of her hair his voice was both grateful and wistful, a clear indication that, much as he might have liked to, he wasn't going to accept the offered bait. "I am truly glad to hear that, dearest," he murmured, shifting slightly away and cupping her cheek in the palm of one hand while she blinked sleepily up at him. "Might I be correct in thinking that your quite ridiculous fear of love has been mended?"

"Maybe so," she giggled, feeling rather girlish and silly when she compared the difference in the cadences of their speech. His was always so proper and tidy, clean of slur or contraction, fitting perfectly to the pure, lilting flow that was his voice; and hers was so simple and modern. That day and age speaking was meant to be quick and time-savvy, relying on the ability to blur words together, create new ones to serve as a speedier means to cut to the intent and purpose behind the conversation. His voice held none of that hurry, none of the cutting, jerky quality she was accustomed to. In fact, she hadn't even been away of just how choppy her American English was until faced with his elegant vernacular. Trying to copy his Old World tone she said, quite crisp matter-of-fact, "yet when put in that manner, you seem a little arrogant. Must I turn my attentions to deflating your overlarge male ego?"

"I beg your pardon?" he retorted, tone stiff, and she was almost afraid that he hadn't caught on to her joke, until she glanced up and saw the flash of violet humor in his eyes. As if pained, he pressed one hand flat to his chest, clutching the spot over his heart and wincing, "that hurts, darling, it truly does. As if _I_ had an _ego…_"

_Sarcasm, sarcasm. _But she didn't quite catch it.

"Of course you do. All men have an ego. Some women too, now that I think about it—and I certainly do." She reached up and tugged at a single silky lock of his hair, curling the pale strand between two of her fingers. "But I don't really mind yours, to be honest. Anyway, I'm tired. I think I'll turn in for the night—" she glanced at the clock, standing on her tip-toes to see over his shoulder, and smacked her palm against her forehead, "—at eight-thirty, sheesh, I must be getting old." She let out a dry sigh, slipping away from his grasp a second time, but still with that silent beckon of positive energy that was just slightly saddened by doing so. It told him that she wasn't sending him away without even having to say a word. "Coming?"

He smiled, her mixture of frankness and humor lifting his mood straight to the clouds while he watched her head for the half-hall that led to her bed and bathroom, her hips swaying with that unconscious, light little walk that only a woman could perform and running a tidying hand through her nut-brown hair. Upon direct invitation for the very first time, he followed her in without protest, more than pleased that she had automatically sought his company for the night – evidence that she had missed him during the previous one. He supposed that maybe she was right and he _was_ developing some sort of ego, but he didn't really mind. How could he not be proud of convincing such a stubborn girl that his affections were good? He had scaled a once invincible wall, and he had breached it with patience, honesty, and love. But in reality, the victory was truly hers for having the courage to let him in.

Taking a graceful seat on the edge of her bed, his attention shifted to watch as she gathered a pair of light blue-plaid pajamas and a simple white sleeveless shirt from her bureau before turning to the adjoining bathroom. "Where are you going?" he questioned curiously, pale head tilting slightly to the side to convey mild curiosity.

A pink flush of embarrassment colored her pretty face when she glanced back at him over her slim shoulder, expression tinged with guilt, teeth fussing at her lower lip. "To change…"

His eyes were kind even while he teased, "again with this unnecessary modesty." And with an indulgent smile, "I will turn if it would make you feel more comfortable."

Her blush lightened, and she returned the smile with slight apology, "ok…" He nodded once, shifting so that his face was to the opposite wall, his back to her. "No peeking, now," she admonished severely, and he could almost see her glaring at his turned back in her best imitation of fierceness.

"I kept myself in check for almost six years," he reminded her pleasantly, "I believe I will be able to handle a few moments."

The sound of fabric being slid aside from skin was an arduously familiar one. After so long, he had grown to associate each sound with the action it belonged to; the shush of the sleeves being pulled off, the shrugging noise that rid her torso of the sweaters she was so fond of, the click of the button and metallic slither of the zipper on her pants just before they slipped down her legs to the carpeted floor. Yet despite his reassurance to her, it was much more difficult to keep his eyes averted now than it ever had been before. The shushing of fabric to skin was a temptation of sound, enticing almost to the point of a physical pull, a gut-clenching curl of heat to twist the mind to places he shouldn't have allowed himself anywhere near. Instinctually he knew this was because of the night they had shared, the intimacy she had allowed to pass between them, and because knowing the shape and feel of her bare, delicate body only made it that much harder for him not to let his head turn just a little to fill his eyes with her again.

When the soft snap of the catch at the back of her bra reached his ears, so sweet a call to forsaking reason and replacing given promises with newer, darker ones, he knew he needed to find a distraction of some kind before he abandoned control and pounced on her like some rabid, fiendish animal. So he slowly stood, keeping his eyes firmly fixed to the NYB Swan Lake poster she had tacked to the wall above the bedside table, and lifted his hand to craft himself some clothes with a simple series of lines cut through the air. Dressing would keep him busy enough to block out the craving, surely. White light flared for a whisper of an instant, and a small bundle of black cloth fell discreetly out of sheer nothingness to drape over his arm, which he set aside for a moment to await his need while shirt and jeans were carelessly stripped off, neatly folded and placed in the seat of a nearby chair.

Her eyes were on him, a gentle touch of consciousness from pretty green eyes. He could feel her silent appraisal of his backside as clearly as though she were touching him, could feel the intake of breath that was just a shade harsher than usual like a feather-stroke to his flesh, could smell the shy admiration in the warm, flowery scent of her skin. He paused, soft black garment held loose in one hand like a small cascade of darkness, indulging her attention by subjecting himself to her stare as it traveled along the lines of his back and shoulders, the scrawling black lines of the wings there. Taking like the compliment it was (not that she was aware of giving it), he let her look, relishing the conscious contact that made him work to suppress a reaction of fevered blood. "How is this fair," he mused, voice just a little harsher with the rough undertone of intrigue, "that you can see me perfectly but I am not allowed to look at you?"

She squeaked, horrified to catch herself eyeing him so boldly, and he heard her turn quickly away with a snap of her neck muscles, apologizing rapidly, and a little hoarsely, "sorry!"

A graceful smile lifted the corners of his lips, distinctly amused, and he shook his head as he stepped into the loose silk slacks acquired from thin air and magic. "Don't be sorry, I do not mind your eyes on me. It is…" he paused delicately, searching for a more dignified way of explaining what his senses all too clearly felt, "comforting. I was alone for a very long time without companionship like this. It is a welcome change."

Though he hadn't been expecting it; her arms slid around his waist, hands locking together before the lower edge of his ribcage while she hugged herself close, her lips touching a soft kiss to the blade of one shoulder. The murmur was a little muffled by her proximity, but he could hear her as she said softly, "I _am_ sorry. I just get antsy. I don't mean to push you away, or anything—"

"I understand, _Ihivah,_" his fingers stroked the back of her hand, thumb smoothing against the skin at her wrist. "I know. You are still young, and still inexperienced, but try not to be so distressed. It does not hurt me." She withdrew a few inches so he could turn and face her again, yet almost as soon as his eyes had settled on her, a frown marred his carved face as he eyed the loose flannel shirt that sealed up her arms and torso. "Must you dress so heavily?"

It was seriously all she could do to keep from laughing at the pouting hint of a whine that lined the question, and she hid it by glancing down at herself with a grim, tight-lipped smile. "I get cold…"

His hands lifting to the buttons that trailed down her front stilled her shrugging explanation with a lurch of her heart; a frenzied leap of excitement that she knew was pure silliness. Long fingers, riddled with tiny iridescent scars and tender with a tell-tale love of books, guided the fastenings from the cloth that held them together, coaxing, entreating, as if the gestures themselves were inquiries of _may I?_ Keen eyes remained acutely trained to the shirt pulling open to expose the camisole she had donned beneath it, the white fabric a fair blend with her pale skin, tight about the bust so that the curves of her breasts were just barely visible before the cloth cut off the view. The second reason for the too-large shirt made obvious…he stared as if entranced, studying the curvature of collarbone to sternum to the slice of cleavage bare and beautiful and so damnably alluring.

He pushed the material from her shoulders, assisting its fall by helping the material slide down her lily-white arms before he tossed it carelessly to the chair along with his own discarded clothing. She met his eyes, though there was a tiny trace of nervousness flickering behind her irises, deciding not to shrink or shy from him, proving both trust and allowance of a similar kind to what he'd given her. Give for even give – if not quite on the same level. He leaned, brushing a soft kiss to her cheek, another to the corner of her mouth, and obliging when she tilted her face to catch his lips with a light, endearing press of affection. Then, taking her elbow, he gently led her to the bed, soothing gently, "I will keep you warm."

She slid beneath the blankets, a little jostled by her weariness, scooting over to give him room to accompany her, and he took the invitation to gracefully lie beside his ward, doing his best not to forfeit better judgment and pin her to the mattress and peel her damned clothes from her skin. It took a ridiculous amount of willpower. He lifted a hand, shutting off the lights with an effortless, absentminded flick of his wrist.

Almost instantly, as if the reaction was tied to the plunge of dark, he could feel Lilith shiver while her smaller body nestled close to his, bundling herself in the blankets, seeking warmth. He wrapped her up in his arms, pulling her to him, feeding her serenity and restfulness, his legs twining automatically with hers as he sought to help her relax and sleep. She nuzzled her cheek against his collarbone; face tucked into the curve of his neck as she closed her eyes and let out a soft, happy sigh. "I love you," she whispered, her voice a sleepy purr of contentment and peace. "I'll love you 'till the day I die."

What she didn't notice was that her partner's light and placid mood suddenly stiffened, the angel's eyes flashing pale and his hands clutching tense against her back. She was off into sleep, her exhaustion catching up to her at last to dump her headfirst into the world of sweet, quiet dreams. But Azrael, against her knowledge, did not sleep at all.

* * *

**Greetings, all! :D A little transition chapter for you today, before we hit the last little arc to this piece of the MH saga. Please remember that as it looks right now, this "story" is running along the lines of a total of five (5) books in length, and this is volume 1. Yes, I know, I need to be taken out and shot. -sigh-**

**To QuietSilhouette: X3 so very happy you like it! I'm not sure what you mean by 'celestia,' but if it's what I think it means, then you'll have to see ;) Yes, I named Lilith purposely after a biblical figure. Chapters remaining for this particular volume…I'll guess ten, but I'm not positive. And Lucifer…we'll have to see for that as well :B**

**To sweetromeo: Much laughter is good! :3 I'm glad you found the last chapter amusing!**

**To my PM reviewer: thanks.**

**..**

**Some other notes, it might take me a little while to get the next chapter up because over half of it needs to be finished. So, I'm not sure when I'll be updating next, hopefully sooner rather than later...we'll see. Also, I've begun posting an MH glossary in my "Deleted Scenes" story slot, which is this weird mix of background stories, defined terms and explanations regarding my MH universe. Some of it won't relate to what you've been reading so far, but might later, and some of it's random weirdness, but was fin to write. So, if you're interested, check it out! **

**Oh, and one last stupid little self-fangirlish thing. For those of you who've seen the 'Twilight' movie, and for those of you who haven't (look him up on IMDB if you like); Jackson Rathbone, the boy who plays Jasper, has been the very closest living person I've been able to find to my mental picture of Azrael. If he was a little physically older and a few features were changed a wee bit. He's not a dead-ringer, but he's pretty damn close. X3 I saw that movie twice in theaters and plan to buy it for no other reason than to drool. **

**-shot-**

**Alrighty, that's all for today, folks. Thank you very much - kindly remember to review, please! - and I will check in with you next time!**


	35. Amaranth

**Chapter 53: Amaranth**

Recommended Listening: "Bother" by Stone Sour

* * *

"Why did Malik want to hurt you?"

Azrael didn't look up from where he still sat in the living room, somewhat precariously perched on the arm of the soft armchair, gazing blankly out the window onto the bustling streets of a regular New York morning, eyes almost glazed, unseeing and clouded. Distractedly, he tilted his head slightly toward where she leaned against the edge of the counter as proof he was listening at least somewhat. "Hmm?"

He had been doing this quite a lot that morning, as if he were only catching snippets of whatever she said while his focus remained locked away in some other world. Ever since she had woken and he had risen dutifully with her he had been reserved and unusually sullen. There was nothing about him that suggested it, but Lilith had the distinct impression that he hadn't gotten any sleep. Not that he really needed it…but he'd lacked the warm, hazy, somewhat ruffled look that he seemed to acquire after taking mortal rest, and since he seemed to enjoy the pastime, missing an opportunity seemed a little odd. She wondered if he was feeling all right, but didn't think it prudent to mention unless he gave her more serious reasons to worry than just a lower mood.

Maybe it was Malik. He hadn't been able to secure the demon's detainment personally, so she supposed he had a reason to fret that Malik might try to slit her throat again. No doubt about it, after all, Azrael was certainly the fretful kind – even under unreasonable circumstances. And this specific circumstance gave him every reason to be stressed…right? Strangely, _she_ didn't feel very afraid, when she probably should have. Why was he looking so severe? She was fine, wasn't she? Unless he suspected the demon might try to get to him again using some more efficient method. But what was the reason for all this chaotic drama – surely it couldn't be something as basic as a mild, demon versus angel tussle. If such a thing even existed…

She didn't honestly know why she'd neglected to ask him sooner. Such an important question, crucial to understand, and yet she hadn't thought to give voice to it. Perhaps the other stresses, the more immediate ones, had gotten in the way, or perhaps things just looked different with half a room between them and two steaming mugs of freshly-brewed coffee perched on the kitchen counter. She didn't know what to blame her blunder on, but regardless of the cause; she was mightily miffed with herself for having ignored the matter.

What she _did_ know, other than that her information reserves were sorely lacking, was that it had something to do with a score which had lain bare between the two immortals, and she had been the tool used in attempts to settle it. Well, didn't that give her the right to know why her life had been thrust into danger? It wasn't that she resented her guardian for not informing her beforehand. After all, he'd told her quite plainly early on that he had his share of enemies, as he'd called them, it was the very reason for keeping so quiet. He'd told her very clearly that there had been a focus of a not-entirely-friendly nature fixed on her – and that alone was more communication than he could have offered, enough to prepare, but not enough to scare her unnecessarily. But now…now she knew enough to inspire a need to understand. Knowing was, perhaps, no less dangerous, but it seemed inconsequentially so after having been under attack already (and wound up reasonably unharmed by it). Besides, she was curious. It was only fair, right?

"Malik," she repeated patiently, her eyes full of his face while she cradled her coffee cup between her hands. "He mentioned something about revenge. Why did he want you hurt?"

"Ah…that. Many, many years ago, he came up with an idea to make an uprising against God easier for the devil to wage by possessing and controlling the soul of Judas Iscariot to wreak havoc upon the earth," Azrael's expression remained rather blank, as though he were only half-focused on the story he was telling, staring off at the world of mortals without much intent concentration on anything. Not even the words pouring from him like honey. "It was a little more complicated than I make it sound, but the details are irrelevant now. When Lucifer bid me come to hear out and test the efficiency of the plan ­– which he does more often than I care to think about – I informed him, honestly to my knowledge, that such a large-scale and high-profile possession would not only be more than difficult for him to oversee from hell, but that it would draw the Almighty right to the perpetrators…which is not a wise move to make. When Malik was pushed aside, cast out of the limelight after being promised a promotion of power and wealth for his efforts, who could he blame but me; the source and cause of the reasoning that sent him back to Tartarus with neither thanks nor glory."

"But why wait until now to hit back?" she pressed, still somewhat puzzled by the long stretch of time between offense and retaliation.

"I had no real weakness he could attack or exploit until recently."

Instead of being insulted, as she would have been a few weeks before upon such a brash implication, she felt her heart swell with sappy girlish pride in response to the reply. She knew better than to distress over being called a _weakness,_ because it wasn't meant in either a negative or insensitive way. He was not blaming or degrading her, simply stating the logic the demon had used when fabricating his plans to use her in order to get under her guardian's skin. There was really something rather sweet about him admitting a lack of connection to anything that could have been used to drag him down before he had found her. He was really giving her a compliment, since he had never really been tempted or swayed by anyone else since the first girl…it showed that he cared, telling her that the idea of her in danger terrified him beyond comprehension.

She smiled, fond and touched, blushing into her cup. "Ah, I see. Well, that makes sense."

Sipping her coffee, she eyed him over the rim of the mug for a moment, having just caught that the last sentence dropped from his mouth had been a little sharp, and that seemed to be the point where she simply couldn't let the matter lie anymore. Setting it down and crossing the room, she let one hand lightly rest against the powerful slope of his arm. It drew his attention from the window, with a subdued, fractured snap, his pale eyes blinking before focusing on her face for the first time in quite a while. The only strange thing was, they didn't come alive with color as they usually did - a recognition acknowledgment with the power of the irises - but remained a bleached, hollow lavender. He titled his head to look up at her as she brushed the white-blond bangs back from his forehead and murmured, "is there something on your mind? You've been awfully quiet this morning."

Gazing down into his carved, porcelain face, she saw again the light, barely evident crease of weariness that lined the white skin; an invisible mark, but one that spoke to her more loudly than his muted words might have done. He was stressed about something, something serious. Yet he shook his head, giving her a tight-lipped smile and denying gently, "it is not worth troubling you with."

Though she had half a mind to retort that anything turning him so distant was more than worth her time and energy, her traitorous eyes took the moment to glance up at the clock, and she made a face as she realized it was time for her to head out for work. There was a flexible little amount of leeway in the timeframe employees had to show up, but it wasn't exactly like she had an hour's worth of flex-space to devote to coaxing the angel into talking, no matter how much she wanted to. She hated having to leave him like this... "I have to go," she sighed, then touched a single fingertip to the edge of her lover's mouth, tracing the sensual line of his lip while she asked, "will I see you later?"

"I have some errands to run, but I will try to be here when you return." He got gracefully to his feet, sliding smoothly from the chair to accompany her out the door; pausing almost vacantly to wait for her while she slipped on a pair of shoes and a jacket, the action seeming more akin to habit than to a conscious outward intent.

After she finished locking up and stowed her keys into her bag, she turned to him and reached up to give his cheek a quick kiss, her lips lingering for a glowing moment against his cool skin. He accepted the gesture, but it seemed odd to her that he did nothing to reciprocate it. All he did was stand there, stiff and somewhat tense, exerting merely the barest effort of brushing his fingers against the back of her hand as a means of temporary farewell before he began to walk away, taking three or four steps down the hall lined by numbered doors before simply vanishing into thin air.

For a moment she stood mildly stunned, her worry flaring back into life while she gazed, a little taken-aback, toward the place where he had just been, both confused and concerned. It hadn't taken her long to discover her guardian was a very physical creature, driven by touch almost more vividly than he was by the other senses but for smell, yet he had barely touched her at all that morning. She had grown accustomed to his lingering, absentminded little caresses, the mild excuses he found to distribute them, the way even the contact of his eyes seemed to be a touch all their own. Yet now that she had gone without, even for such a short span of minutes, she felt cold and incomplete.

It had been obvious that there was something weighing heavy on his shoulders; she could only recall moments of similar sobered expression and distanced attitude, briefly after the - what had he called it? - the Deacca, and when he was deep in thought. But he had never really come across the same way, with the same kind of stiffness, and she really couldn't harbor a guess as to what the cause might be. But maybe she was worrying too much. Perhaps he'd merely had a bad dream, or had remembered a meeting he wasn't looking forward to. More than likely, she was overreacting. In any case, she was already looking forward to the end of her shift. It would be nice to come home to his handsome face.

Smiling faintly as she set aside the niggling remaining traces of concern, she trotted off down the cement hall, prancing lightly down the four flights of stairs to the ground, and ran through the rain pouring in sheets from the gray sky to her car. It was nice to have it back. She had almost forgotten how much she adored the heating system in the little blue Toyota – it made getting to work a smoother, less dangerous, and much more pleasant ordeal.

Of course, _danger_ was all relative. it could come in the form of almost anything, including a certain redheaded coworker and friend who attacked her almost immediately upon entry through the staff door to the library, glomping her around the middle and squealing dramatically, "guess what! Guess what!"

Lilith brought herself to a rocky, somewhat unstable halt, startled by Sarah's abrupt, and rather spastic excuse for a greeting, her eyes widening while tucking her keys into her pocket and answered with a wary, "what?"

"I talked to Alice this morning…Elijah proposed on their date last night! Can you _believe_ it?"

And just like that, her thoughts were whisked in a completely different direction, glomming onto the prospect of Alice's imminent marriage - the very first of her girls to do so - with a startled mesh of surprise, joy, wonder, and excitement while Sarah promptly launched into a flurry of chatter about how wonderful everything was going to be.

_Wonderful..._

* * *

The shallow, scattered thumps of the heavy tomes echoed like a worn-out drum, old and tired. But the sound, if sound without voice could harbor feeling, was edged with something desperate. Sheaf after sheaf of documents he sifted through, book after book, skimming each list of contents with hyper-swift vision only to set every single one dejectedly aside, frustrated, picking up another only to do just the same again. There was something he had overlooked out of work-found weariness, surely – some loophole left blank for the sake of...what?

Why did he keep coddling this wishful dream that there was some kind of safety net? Why should there be? No one had planned for such a situation, not when the rules had been written, not before, not after; there had been no need. It had been foolish from the beginning to hope for such an opening, such a gift. Still, he searched on, pleading with every fate he knew how to name that there was another way. _Any _other way.

Engrossed with his questing, he didn't hear the footsteps drawing near, the lilt of a rippled echo of presence that thrummed amid the great arched ceiling with its columns and winding shelves and ever-shifting staircases. By all rights, he should have, even as light as the steps were, but he didn't exert even the slightest bit of energy into outside wariness, even for the normal range of personal protection. He felt neither threatened nor insecure there, it was true, most didn't, but that didn't change the natural immortal tendency to keep an eye on their surroundings; and he was looking nowhere but down at the piles and liberal piles of papers. When Enoch came up to perch herself at the edge of the table, he started, surprised.

"What's wrong, _Bera'hiu?_" she asked him, voice soft, penitent for having startled him, tentative, almost as if she feared he might break under the weight of the words. "I could feel your aura trembling all the way down the hall..."

He said nothing, appearing scattered and confused by her question, glancing helplessly down at the book cupped in his hands. "She..." The voice that came from his throat didn't sound like his own, but rough and cracked, hard with uncertainty. Could he even say it? "She'll die..."

Her eyes, one rose, the other the color of bluebells, suddenly widened with dawning apprehension as they took in the assortment of volumes scattered and stacked in a scramble of chaos around her seat. "Oh, _Christ_—" she whispered, hand halfway to her mouth before she caught her breath back. "I hadn't even thought about that." Sorrow painted her hair dull, the blue graying as if the spiky, silken azure strands had been faded with a downpour of sickly rain, her face sad and afraid for her twin, catching his despair as though it was her own. "What will you do?"

The wrist she gripped with her petite ivory hand was cold, stiff and frozen with the terror that gripped his heat and leeched outward trough his strong angelic skin. His lips moved, barely, a whisper on the air that spoke with the words and phrases that lined the enormous heavenly library in the shapes of innumerable books and scrolls, the hush of many voices, but none of them the right ones. None of them with anything to tell him but what he wished he couldn't hear. "I don't know," he told his sister truthfully, his grayed lavender eyes belying the fluctuating taint of fear and loss and pure, miserable dread. "I don't know."

Silence fell, the whispers stalled, falling prey into the darkness that devoured all things.

_Pitiless._

There was no other way, was there? The trouble was, he already knew the answer to the question he didn't dare form with his voice.

* * *

She shoved the door open with her shoulder, the bagged box of Chinese taking up the hand opposite the one tucking the keys into her pocket as she half-stumbled across the threshold with the rather violent give of the barrier beneath her weight. The wood seemed to have swelled again, as it did sometimes in the cold, blasted thing. The first stop was a hopping pause at the entryway to kick her shoes off, balancing bag and steaming food with minor tipping, before heading directly for the kitchen to deposit the chow mien and orange chicken on the counter.

With a small jolt, she found that Azrael was already waiting for her, and had her mouth open to voice a greeting upon recognizing instinct...and promptly shut it almost a half-second after doing so. Unlike that morning, when she had sensed the mild edge of fatigue to his poise, a light-settled stress, she knew from an immediate glance that something was very wrong. The angel was seated on the couch in the living room, hunched over in what at first appeared to be pain, head hung in a pose of silent, down-trodden defeat. His eyes were dull and light in color, fixed to a single spot on the carpet, downcast and filled with blank, unfeeling gray. Even his clothes lacked their usual sharp, expertly-tailored glory, exchanged for a pair of loose jeans, torn open and ragged at the knees, and an ill-fitting white shirt that brought the greyish tinge out in the pallor of his skin.

This was _not_ normal; not some casual worry or lingering doubt upon the mind. This was something much more than casual or simple, more than a light, everyday stress. Where was his usual grace and dignity of posture? Where was the usual intelligent, kindly piercing gleam of his eyes? Where had his gentle, regal majesty hidden to find itself replaced by this ill-looking, crestfallen demeanor? He hadn't even acknowledged her presence...

"Azrael?" He neither looked up nor answered her, failing to state that he had noticed her in any way in favor of remaining motionlessly slouched, which frightened her immensely.

He was not acting like the angel she knew, who had always kept a smile for her, no matter what troubles were stored behind the porcelain _façade_…rather like a tortured, despairing man bound to his deathbed. Never, in the time she had known him, had he once been depressed about anything. He had been upset, of course – angry, worried, irritated – but never so crushingly sad. He never seemed to have a reason or the mind to be distraught about anything; it was always he to give her cheer, he who brightened her world with his luminance and grace. He had lifted her back to her feet often in her lifetime, and he had never once complained or despaired over anything. Not like this…never so devoid, so leeched of hope or life. He looked so downtrodden, like a kicked puppy left out in the rain, and in dire need of comforting. Yet how was she to comfort him when she didn't even know what was causing the mood? What did one say to a dispirited angel?

Unsure, she approached, kneeling on the carpet before him and peering up at his downcast face – wrought dark with melancholy and completely closed off to the world around him. "Azrael," her voice was quiet and timid. "What's wrong?" Still, he didn't speak, but at last he moved; an empty, faithless shift of arms and shoulders to bury his face in his hands. His shoulder…was shaking. Was he _crying?_

_Dear _God_..._

She braced her hands against his knees, fright at his overwhelming sadness snaking up her body to clutch at her brain, her voice gaining an edge bordered on the frantic. "Please talk to me." No answer, and gripping his jeans with chilled, shaking fingers she cried, "_Azrael,_ you're _scaring_ me!"

_That_ broke him out of his trace-like state almost instantly; jerking as though startled and looking up, he blinked, then sighed. There were no tears in his eyes or lining his cheeks, but for the first time in days he sounded tired and forlorn, even while resting his hands over hers and squeezing to give reassurance. "I'm sorry, Sweetling. I just—"

With the breath that he sucked in through lips pursed against another outburst of feeling his expression darkened again, once more adopting the cold and desolate shell. Something ominous lay beneath that look, a deep, festering self-despair spent to bend and warp his proven-tender soul; an ancient force, terrible, destructive, and seething with hatred for the higher power that had called it into life. It bordered on the expressionless vacancy that she remembered all too well – that she shouldn't have recalled as well as she did – from the photograph tacked on a dingy office wall to preserve the unhappy memory vaguely echoed in the words that slid so easily, and so brokenly from his throat. "I never should have come—never should have shown myself to you, exposed you to this world," he shook his head, utterly dejected, eyes closing under the heavy weight of misery. "I never should have acted upon such an impulse."

She tried to suppress the wince that jerked reflexively from her body, recoiling as though struck with a condemnation. She really did try, but it simply didn't work; the throb of hurt squeezing at her insides as though she were being gripped by a great, iron-fisted hand did something to counteract any ability she might have had to conceal the sudden shock of pain. He was leaving her…of course he was. He didn't want a weak, cowardly thing like her anymore. He was tired of her frailty, tired of always having to save her from the jaws of unspeakable torture and death, bored of her shy, inexperienced attempts at being a lover. She supposed it was to be expected, but here she had thought him accepting of her fragility. After all those years of watching over her and caring for her without thanks or praise, and the way he always looked at her; the way he had always touched her – gently, with such warmth filling his eyes. She had thought him patient, loyal, forgiving...had that just been naivety shadowing reality?

In another instant, she was gripped firmly by the arms and yanked roughly forward into the firm wall of Azrael's chest, his arms wrapped so tightly around her that he probably could have crushed her ribs had he any less control. "No, _no,_ darling! I didn't mean it like that," the note to his voice was pure apology, pained and almost pleading, a deep-draw compulsion willing her to understand. "I love you more than anything in the world, I would _never_ leave you." He pulled back his head to look her in the eyes, his own pale irises stark with sincerity yet somehow still tinged with some internal travail, the darkness in the room shifting behind him like the descending shadow on a raven's wings. In sorrow, her name colored his lips with the blush of roses stained with old blood. "But I can't—my promises..."

Her hurt changed to concerning confusion in a flash, her tears already forgotten and clearing. _Now_ she understood…the darkness was that of the past, eons of loneliness and anguish flaring into prominent memory, coils of barbed-wire wrapped tightly around the sacred heart, squeezing and pricking the tender flesh, the hanged man, patron of sacrifice and solitude. Her hand lifted to his cheek, tracing the smooth, angular lines of his cheek and jaw bones, wanting him to explain so that she could puzzle out the reason for his mood. What was it causing him so much distress and, ultimately, what could she do to help him through it?

He leaned into her caress, eyes flickering closed once again to relish the soft, human warmth of her skin against his – inhuman skin which, for the first time, did not draw from her bloodheat. His own hand rose in partnership, sliding over the back of hers to keep her palm in place against his cheek, his other arm wrapping even more tightly about her waist to draw her just a fraction nearer. He breathed in deeply, the scent of her stronger at her wrist – rich, floral, like a wild lily, intoxicating, mingling with the human heartbeat that pulsed within her veins. A deadly mix to an otherwise pious angel. The downfall of divinity forged completely by choice.

"What do you mean?" she asked when he didn't add on to the cryptic remark, not sure what he meant by it. The affectionate touch to her hand, inhaling the smell of her skin, and the steady pressure of his arm pushing her body into a sheltering cradle between his thighs and kept steady by a powerful arm was a little disconcerting. He touched her as if he was desperate for contact, desperate for the comfort that, somehow, he could only find within her...as if her were scared to death that he might lose her to that looming shadow. "I don't understand—"

Azrael's smile was sad, ever patient, and he consented to explain; easing his grip around her, twining his fingers with her own as if to soothe his hectic mood. "You are mortal," he told her, as if that alone said everything. "One day, like it or not, you will die and your soul will be sent to heaven or hell. But even if you are destined for heaven, we will still be..."

His voice went hoarse, and broke, accented by the uncomfortable swallow of air and a choking lump of emotion that took another shaky breath to ease. "My job is to escort the dead to their final resting place, as you know. Yet after this, in Elysia—in heaven—I have nothing more to do with them." Grayed lavender eyes were staring down at their clasped hands so hard it seemed that he meant to burn right through them, his brow furrowed, eyes steadily darkening, his grip on her fingers and palms stiffening as the planes of his face froze over like fired glass. "I am lawfully forbidden to. After I have fulfilled by duty to my maker, I will never be permitted to see you again—"

For the second time, his voice cracked, made weak by a panicked flare of fear and shame and sorrow. He let out a gasping cough and hung his head, looking for all the world like a child separated from his favorite stuffed toy. " I…I don't know if I'm strong enough to..." He sounded so defeated, heartbroken, that sleek steel of his resolve, normally so cool and collected, hovered on the very brink of shattering. "Why I didn't think about this sooner—well, of course it's obvious, all I could think of was ending my own pain that I didn't stop to _think. _What a damn fool I've become." He let out a bark of laughter, which made her jump and ogle, startled by the cold, dry and very distinct lack of humor. Lack of anything at all, really, except remorse, regret, and the sour, wretched taint of distant gloom.

Frankly, Lilith found herself completely stunned by the display of faltering, childlike vulnerability; the angel had never looked so old nor so young, so tired or strained or helpless as he did just then. So negative – every word a mixture of reproach and the dour of impending doom. While she knew he was depressive by nature, she hadn't expected such a...violent response. He was just so controlled all the time, yet he had lost that expansive, flexible rationale in favor of such a blatant half-frenzy?

She peered disconcertedly down at him, feeling the grip around her delicate hands tighten to an almost uncomfortable level while he clung to them as though they were a lifeline. He was shaking, as though trying desperately to hold back A scream of agony or despair held trembling on the tip of his tongue. The trembling tore at her heart, and, sharing his terrible pain, her stomach wrung with the sickening arrival of more tears, quite wishing she could curl up in the nearest corner and cry herself into senselessness. How female and utterly useless. _He_ had never once cried, not even when he had known he would feel pain beyond her mortal comprehension; he had welcomed it, stared it down, an exemplary conduit of courage and pride. Now, as she looked down to see his teeth clenched with a pain that very well could have been physical, she wondered if he would break.

Why was this happening? She had been under the impression that he would always be with her, always linger by her side to offer a reassuring word or a sturdy shoulder, a friend and confidant and partner she had thought would be with her forever. And now he revealed that he wouldn't…_couldn't_ do that. Just when she had been beginning to fathom the depth of the happiness he could bring her, just when she'd thought she had found her place in life, she turned around to find that it was slipping through her fingers. She had always been very good at assessing her physical status, ever since she had been little, but skill or no skill, reality or not, she seriously couldn't tell whether or not the sensation of drowning was real or imagined. It felt as if her entire world was crashing down into pieces of oblivion.

Was this it, then? Would he be forced to leave her anyway, despite his word, to save his sanity and keep the world in balance between the two forces of life and death? Or would he refuse and let the underlying fact that she would age, grow old, wither, and eventually die to be taken out of his charge for the rest of eternity drive him to destruction? How brutally unfair this was. What was the point of giving him the gift of a human heart and the capacity for human companionship if, in the end, it would just be taken away? That was nothing but cruel.

_Why_ was this happening to them?

Fighting back her own shivery desire to sob herself into hysterics, she forced herself to keep calm, easing one of her hands from the crushing grip he had around it and gently removed the tie that attempted to keep his hair in line. The locks of white-gold spilled from captivity to veil him from sight, concealing the grayed tint to the death-pale face. Searching fingers found his chin, tense and drawn with the clench of the jaw, and traced up the side of his face to comb through the loose tresses while she tried to calm him by the soothing strokes. It was her turn to be strong, and that was what she was going to be.

"Isn't there _some_thing we can do?" It was a halfhearted, desperate question, and a stupid one at that, the knowledge of it mirrored in the waver to her croaking whisper. As soon as it slid past her lips she wished she hadn't said it. Harboring hope for some handy magical solution to the problem at hand was misplaced and foolhardy, not to mention unlikely. There was no cure for age, no matter how unwanted and annoying it would be for him to stay young and handsome and strong forever while she grew frail and wizened and gray. There was no cure for injustice, despite what the good book so beloved by priests might say. There was fault even in heaven, as no one ever wanted to hear but halfheartedly believed anyway. And he...would be left alone.

But this couldn't be right. He had given her enough insight into the twists and complexities of his world for her to know things were never so simple as _yes_ and _no._ There must have been a way, some loophole around the laws he seemed so ardent in keeping. Surely, _surely_ she could not be meant to allow his heart-blooded depression to surface all over again. Was this not what Beelzebub had warned her about? Was she not supposed to do what she could to help keep her angel sane and virtuous? What was it the Almighty expected her to do as a human powerless to stop the descent of time?

...and why had he gone so very still all of a sudden?

Silence drew a long line through the darkness, the muscles and tendons Azrael's strong shoulders pulled tense as the shivers snapped into frozen stillness and the grip of his hands held a different edge to it. There was some new emotion lining the aura that pulsed around him, a new kind of anxiety to pierce the aura she had grown accustomed to feeling wrap and flow around her; something nasty and bitter, coated with the taste of fear. A breath...two breaths, thick, deep inhales split only by the momentum used to wet his lips before he said, very slowly, "I…"

But she didn't catch the connotation behind the hint of terror. In fact, she could barely contain her eagerness upon realization that the hesitation was based on one very thrilling concept. There _was_ a way. "Yes?" Hope swelled, her heart pounding so loudly that she nearly expected it to burst while she watched him, closely enough to have given herself a headache had she not been so hyped on the surge of adrenaline.

What she _did_ catch was the suddenly quite intense, undulating ripple of protectiveness to stain the humanoid fatigue that coated the air. Azrael shifted his posture until he sat in a manner that seemed almost conservative in nature, eyes guarded. He didn't want to tell her. It wasn't that he couldn't, not the repeat of a ban on the sharing of confidential information to force him into silence – he didn't _want_ to. Yet knowing that was altogether quite puzzling; she was confused by this skittish silence, this doubting precaution lined with the invisible battle of do or don't so obviously going on underneath that fine porcelain face. How could a way to keep them together be so bad that it would cause his guarding instincts to flare up so vividly? Or...was he just being his usual paranoid self?

"Tell me," she pleaded, tugging at his shirt collar, and brushing the back of her hand against his jaw as she did so to feel that his teeth were gritted. _Hard._

He spoke, and it became apparent as soon as the sound of his voice made contact with her ears that he had decided to put up his shields rather than let her in. "No," he said, and it was the sheer, quiet note of defeat to the tone that kept her from taking offense from his determined refusal to confide in her. She simply stared as he lifted his head and gave her the only smile he seemed able to muster – a thin, strained lift of tight lips that seemed more grimace than smile. "It's not important. We have the rest of your life, after all—a good, long life. I will always treasure that."

One lifetime.

_Wish I was too dead to cry..._

But it wouldn't be enough. She could see that concealed in the haunted depths of his eyes, see it painted across his cheeks like two dark, brooding slashes. One lifetime would not be enough to counter an eternity of black, toxic solitude; no matter how much relief she was able to give him during that short time, it could never hope to quench the terrible, permanent thirst of forever. Nor would it be fair for him to go through almost half of that lifetime stuck with a ward who would gradually become too old for him to love, not that she thought he would really care all that much, but it came down to respectability. He wouldn't be able to touch an old woman just yards away form her deathbed, even when touch was such a prominent portion of his senses.

Jesus, but did it hurt. It had been bad enough seeing the soulless, color-bleached eyes staring out at her through a piece of photo paper tacked to a dirty wall, but now... This was an angel of God, beautiful face drawn with a sad, dreary meshing of emptiness and regret that did _not_ belong aligned with those features. The pain of it bit into her, so deeply that an ache started to build up in her chest, a stitch, like the kind she used to get from running too much in her Junior High gym classes, only wider, deeper, and searing. She hated this. He had been so good to her, despite the fact that she'd done her absolute damndest to deny him. And she couldn't do anything to help him, could she?

She was frowning, and even though she felt a little petulant for it, she stubbornly asserted, "I want to know. Maybe it's not so bad—"

"_No._"

He shot her down so sharply that it gave her a start, jolting her into actually drawing backward a fraction of an inch. He had done it before, when she'd cut herself to donate blood, but this time was by far the scarier in comparison. Fear mixed with the furious force of his compulsive magic to strike her protest raw was enough to make her nerves seizure and spasm, the trembling light, which told her he hadn't done it intentionally, but disturbing. Why was it so horrible to him? He wanted to be with her, he'd made that excruciatingly clear, so what was the problem with her wanting it too?

"No..." he rephrased it, gentler, a mild stroke of his voice to soothe her ruffled fur, as if to a kitten he'd accidentally startled with a moment of harshness. Yet it didn't entirely comfort her, not with such a serious issue still at hand. She wanted to try again, to cajole and plead with him until he gave in and told her, but he didn't seem to be in the mood. In fact, it didn't look like he'd be having any of it, not even the appeal in her eyes. He shook his pale head, the motion stuck somewhere between firm decision and a dark resignation bound by sorrow; a gesture that rendered the spluttering, faltered trip-falls of her bewildered argument to the harmless level of raindrops. "It is hardly better this way...if I had any sense of propriety left I _should­­_—but I don't think I could bear to strip your memory now."

She gaped, alarmed that the thought had passed his mind, even if fleeting and pushed aside. "But I—"

Again he interrupted, this time by getting to his feet and stating calmly, almost oddly so, as if every trace of that vivid emotion he contained had been sealed away somewhere deep inside. To her rather uneducated eye, it seemed that he had gone deliberately stony to shelter her from his sorrow. And he seemed to want to leave, because just her presence burned him with the knowledge of what he would eventually lose. "I had best be getting back now. I shall visit again tomorrow, I should have my head back on straight by then." His lips were cold against her mouth, stony and inflexible as he pressed a quick kiss of farewell to her skin. It sent a shocking chill through her, derived not from pleasure in the touch but from the very nature of it; as if he had felt obligated, but as if it cut him deep to the quick to do so.

_Wish I'd died instead of lived._

He didn't even bother to straighten or take a step back before vanishing, and the dematerializing of his flesh left a disorienting chill in his wake without the effort left behind to ease the transition from accompanied to alone. Blinking, still crouched on the carpet alongside the seat of the couch, the imprint of his cold mouth against her skin tingling, as if tiny crystals of ice had been left to stab like needles...as if she had needed yet another hint.

As if she needed to be told twice that her guardian had been bleeding right before her eyes.

She should have pressed him. Nothing could justify this amount of suffering..._nothing. _Not for him, not after everything he'd done and gone through for her. God or no god, it wasn't right. What was she expected to do, just sit there and live out the rest of her life watching him waste away right along with her? Maybe not physically, but he would, until there was nothing left but a shell of his former glory. Death without his righteous purpose, now there was a frightening thought. There was just no way this was the path they were meant to walk; he always spoke so highly of _mother, _so very highly, with such devotion and love, even if he had been a little grudging about it now and then. She couldn't honestly imagine that the very same god who had given her son such a gift could truly deign to turn it into a curse.

There was a way – he'd all but said there was. Surely, whatever the method or process, surely it would be worth it to stay with him? Had she ever wanted anything so badly in her life? It was almost ironic to note that the answer was _no,_ after so much time had been spent assuring herself that she would be just fine and dandy living out her life as a spinster until she died. How wrong she had always been, and the one thing to make her turn her back on that self-assured lifestyle had lingered just inches away for literal _years._

Ultimately, as Lilith sat there and listened to the thoughts trailing around and around inside her own skull, she reached the conclusion that the whole situation came down to one basic problem and one basic (if a little wishy-washy) solution. First, just how much was she willing to give up, if necessary? Second, did she have the courage to bully an angel, her lover or not, into laying his protective instincts aside? Because she knew she wanted to be with him, but what exactly would that mean for her life as it was now? Would she be shirking her nature-given place in the universe for the sake of one man? Did she really care if she did?

No, she didn't care.

He was worth it.

* * *

**Yosh! :D I live!!**

**First order of business... my apology for making you wait. Life kinda grabbed me by the hair and pulled and it hurt. Plus, my old computer died and we got a new one and Vista's craptacular, and...all this other crap. The only reason I finished today like I did is because of Sakura Con, so let's all give the Seattle convention center and all the cool anime nerds a round of applause (Yes, I'm an otaku, if a mild one. And I've been watching _Death Note_** like a mofo. Hush). So, I'm very, very sorry.

**I cranked this thing out pretty quickly and didn't give it a thrice-over, so there're probably some little grammar/spelling mistakes, sorry ahead of time. I was feeling guilty and wanted to give you your update **

**u-u**

**Those of you who caught the filler-ness of the last chapter...bravo! I dig filler chapters. I adore them, and I would continue to write them even if I didn't have a good excuse to do so. See, there's this thing called life, I'm sure you all know what I mean...and how it never really goes the way we'd like it to, or think it should. So, if timing doesn't flow in a way that makes sense in real life, why should it in fiction? Sadly, it's been my observation that many people think fiction needs to make sense, when reality doesn't necessarily have to. Hey, it works for other writers. Me? I say screw the rules. **

**This one was difficult to write. Some of this was melded in with what will be the next chapter, which I spread out because it was moving too quickly. And so while I had most of it already outlined...it was crappy and needed serious revitalizing, as does the next chapter, so it'll probably take me a while.**

**This is also the point where we come to the clichéd and typical romancey-lame part of my plot. Before I get any complaints about it, all I'm going to say is that I've been spelling it out now for a while, just a little subtly and between-the-lines. And the little problem I've just set out for you is more complicated than I have (and will) made it seem. **

**1) the problems won't end where you think they will**

**2) it's not as fantastically wonderful as it sounds**

**3) it's a freaking fantasy/romance, give me a break, please**

**SO! Don't complain about it, please, I can accept that not everyone will like it. But that's the way of an author's life. **

**On to the issue of length, I've had a few questions about how many chapters this monster is destined to have, and I'm going to be as honest as is possible: I don't know. For this volume (one of five, as it's looking to be), I'm going to tentatively shoot for fourteen more chapters not including this one and the epilogue. So...fifteen more slots to fill, gods willing. As for the other four books...no idea. Hope that's helpful in deciding whether or not you want to abandon me yet XD**

**lol.**

**Well, I'll leave it there, and get cracking on the next chapter asap! (jesus, these things are getting longer every chapter...)**

**As always, please review and remember that I love you all! **

**See you next time! **


	36. Black Water

**Chapter 54: Black water**

Recommended Listening: "Porcelain" by Helen Jane Long and "Desire of Ages" by Sleepthief

* * *

Itchy.

Her whole body itched with restless anxiety, skin close to crawling with a twisted combination of adrenaline and worry near impossible to contain. Her stomach growled, hunger derived from having gone a night without the dinner still sitting cold and untouched on the counter, but she didn't hear it. She just paced, as she had been doing for the past...could she even recollect how long? Hours – long, dragging hours that ticked by like days, weeks, months worth of time; and all the while she itched until she felt utterly mad with the compulsion to scream and tear out her hair.

For the life of her, she could not understand him. One day he was shining and bright, glowing like a teenage boy hapless in love, the next he was an absolute mess, mourning for someone who wasn't even dead yet. Sure, he'd told her why, and it was a reasonable concern to have...but for the love of everything holy, it did _not_ explain why he was being so ridiculously stubborn about shutting her out! She just didn't get it. How could a method to cheat death and keep her with him possibly be so awful that he would refuse to so much as speak of it? Just..._how? _Darn it all, she was supposed to be his partner, he was supposed to talk to her, to let her help him! But no, he was just being stubborn and overprotective and downright silly.

She had worked herself into a good stew of anger by the time said angel had calmed himself down enough to attempt another visit, beside herself with frustration and having almost fretted herself into a frenzy. When her red-rimmed eyes flickered upward to register that the new shape and presence in her living room was the very same one that had left her so haggard and ruffled the night before, she bolted across the room like a woman possessed to fill her hands with his shoulders and clutch like a manacle, determined not to let him get away a second time.

"_Tell me!_"

It was the first thing out of her mouth, half-crazed and hoarse, jerked from her throat like a parched plea for water, and the warm, practiced greeting smile fell from his lips as though the demand had wiped it off. His eyes went starkly pale, focused on the fraying state of her once tidily-knotted hair and yesterday's clothes, the circles under her eyes and the pinch to her cheeks from having unintentionally starved herself. "What in—"

"For the love of God," she cried, "just _tell_ me!"

He made the leap in a flash, as was to be expected from him, clever as he was, but he had the audacity to feign confusion, cocking his head to one side and painting an inquisitive air across the mask her wore so damnably well. "Tell you what, darling?"

For a straight minute all she did was stare at him, her mouth open, a whirl of emotions and feelings coursing through her like bile, each one mirrored clear on her face, free to read. She stared, anger, fear, frustration, weariness, hysteria, all of it warping her so violently that she didn't quite know what to say or do; and he looked back at her, that beautiful face so serene, so cool, so fair. A lie. _Curse_ him. She felt her stomach clench and unclench with the unmistakable return of the tears that had made their threat all those hours ago, and closed her eyes tightly in a halfhearted attempt to ward them off. Fingers brushed against her cheek, painstakingly sympathetic, but only a whisk of touch was tolerated before she let her head drop forward, too tired and stressed to care if it was a sign of weakness, and buried her face in the soft black fabric draping his chest. "_Please..._"

Despite her hope for it, she didn't actually expect him to answer – and he didn't really, not the way she wanted – but, his voice was subdued, all that forced, false cheer abandoned. "Must we discuss this further? I thought we had decided." One large, gentle hand rested soft and sad against her back.

"_You_ decided," she pushed away, forceful enough to cause herself to stumble, but refused the reflexive reach of his arm to steady her. Instead, she mustered up the best glare she could find, which was really just a rather severe look from tired, unhappy eyes and a pursed mouth. "_I_ don't remember having much say in the matter."

A sigh came first, and the rest of his glamour dropped like a cloak shoved back from his shoulders to reveal the saddened tight-lipped man she remembered from the night before, complete with the sickly gray-tinged skin that so concerned her. The breath was heavy from his lungs, causing one stubborn, stray piece of pale hair to flutter and shine under the early light coming in from the uncovered window just a few yards away. It came as one soft, unexpected word; the lilt of his voice so clear, so achingly lovely that it could have been the fall of fresh winter snow. "Immortality," he murmured, defeated, so quiet that she could just barely hear. "I could grant you immortality."

Lilith felt her breath still almost on direct time with the fade of her temper. Immortality. _That _was the way he'd silently avoided mentioning? Did that mean what she thought he meant? _Immortality;_ to live forever. To see eternity pass before her eyes while she never aged. Never to grow old, never to _die_. What a thing that would be, to be like him; to swap drab, fleeting, bitter humanity for that long, glorious element of time. To be able to watch the people, watch their lives cycle and turn, the wheel of Earth as it spun without knowing the impact of its touch upon herself.

"You can do that?" she breathed, and she could literally feel the awe that shimmered up her throat in league with the sound of her own voice, and promptly froze. What did it take for someone to completely change a mortal's genetic makeup? She had never even heard whispered theories on the subject before, not even from the most outlandishly imaginative believers, not even a speck of a guess as to the possibility. God above, the sheer amount of raw _power_ that must take… She could recall his rather vague explanation of being a magician, a wielder of divine energy, had even seen him use it once or twice; but just what kind of strength did he have, exactly? She gaped up at him, stunned breathless while hopelessly floundering to wrap her brain around the idea of her prim, soft-spoken guardian possessing the ability to modify her species. The wonderment filling her voice was a overwhelmed, admiration a streak of reverence when she murmured, "I had no _idea_ you were so powerful—"

He looked upset; and it was distressing to see him appear so chaotically low, disquieted hurt etching invisible lines at the corners of his mouth. And to make matters worse, she couldn't understand why it was there. What was so bad about immortality? But he seemed in a mood better suited for explanation today, and gestured toward the sofa. "Sit down, please." She immediately sat, hoping that her obedience would encourage him to help her apprehend whatever was causing him such obvious unease, eyes pinned eagerly to his face and her hands in her lap, adoration still painted across her expression like a color. "It is not an option." He took an unhappy breath. "Not because of what it could give us, or even the energy it requires. It is the penalty that I fear."

"What penalty?"

He joined her on the couch, sinking heavily into the cushion beside her, indulging in a silent moment to brace himself before turning his head to look directly into her eyes. "Due to the application of several laws created specifically to discourage what is viewed as a dishonest, even underhandedly offensive action, the chastisement for the new immortal is an automatic sentence to hell."

_Oh_...

Well, that _was_ rather serious. Serious and alarming.

She could feel the apprehensive doubt creeping across her face like a blush, only chillingly cold in place of the warmth of embarrassment. It was infuriating, such a clear betrayal of her impulsive feeling when she hadn't had the time to really think about it yet, regretful, mainly because she could see the justified, knowing hint to the frown shading the edges of his mouth. As if he'd expected nothing less.

His eyes had softened to a heartbreaking shade of lavender; a color so pale that it was almost white. Bleached of tone – bleached of soul, just like that photograph in the demon prince's office. The weight of that boundless gaze pierced her deep in the heart, sending an agonizing, panging wave of misery through her tired body. So sad his eyes were, completely and resolutely bound to a fate that he wanted so desperately to deny, but couldn't find the will or the means with which to do so. "I would not wish that fate upon you for anything. No, it is far better this way, to let you go as nature intends."

But it wasn't _enough._

Knowing that her decision must be made quickly, she ran through the options, her temples throbbing as though they would implode from the overload of information. Hell. A while ago that prospect wouldn't have frightened her. Naively, she had thought that surely if the prince of demons was nothing more than a mischievous, foul-mouthed rake the rest of the realm would be just as tame. The ordeal with Malik, brief as it had been, had changed her mind. He'd scared her out of her wits, and the one experience was enough to make her question whether or not the idea of eternal damnation really was all its reputation made it seem. Now the idea of an eternity in hell, the home of the damned and the souls fallen out of God's graces, the sanctuary for sins and horrors beyond her comprehension, chilled her very blood.

It was a high penance to pay, that was clear. But she _owed_ him, and here was her chance to repay that debt. Did he really think that after his willingness to pay any price for her, that she wouldn't be capable of the same? He would be torn to pieces, shredded into a shadow of what he was, if she ever left him, even by the natural hand of his own element – whether he admitted it or not. All this time, all those warnings for her to heed, and less than half had been about what she had thought the real problem was. None of it had had anything to do with sex, but with something much more intimate; an eternal bond with this one man, more binding than marriage, more meaningful than a vow of celibacy, more than anyone of her simple, mismatched upbringing could have hoped to understand before that very moment.

They had never been warning her of his flaws in control, but of his deep-set need for companionship. He needed her, he needed salvation. He needed the security of knowing that, unlike the woman from his past, _she_ would not abandon him to the slow, decaying descent of solitude worse than the very damnation he protested against. They had warned her, all the while pleading with her to save him. They had warned her.

Well, consider her warned; it hardly mattered now. Deep down, she knew that she would face the devil himself if it meant saving her guardian.

Her mind made up, she lifted her chin and gave him a smile, one that was far steadier than she had expected it to be. "I'll do it."

"Lilith—" With a choked gasp, he struck himself into a staggered breath of taut silence; the expression struck across his face one of literal shock, absolutely astounded by the voiced decision. "No—"

"Yes," she said simply, frank and precise, voice quiet while cutting him efficiently off. Green eyes bright with a mixture of set determination and ardor, she pushed herself along the couch until she could feel the lean slope of his thigh pressed to her knee, her balance a little shaky due to the angle it twisted her back to. Her arms lifted, languid for all the haste she took to wrap her hand around the back of his neck pull his mouth to hers.

Azrael's eyes widened, the color shifting, stricken, to a shocked fuchsia. For once, she was being forceful; shy, timid Lilith was demanding something from him. He couldn't remember her ever instigating a kiss like that before...tentative and shy had been her usual approach, and while that was intriguing in its own right, this new, commanding edge to her love was absolutely _intoxicating_. He wanted her, more than anything; wanted eternity with her, to kiss and coddle and love. She who made his twice-accursed heart race with fulfillment and joy – how he could even imagine facing the bleak stain of the darkness after holding her, he truly had no idea. But he knew it had to be done.

She was trying to sway him, coax him into submission. Clever of her to use his weaknesses against him; the heat of her body, so close, within reach, barred by nothing but fabric so easy to tear away, and the flavorful, pleading temptation of her lips was gratingly difficult to deny. All the same, he forced himself to pull away. He couldn't let her methods of persuasion get under his skin. He could not – _would_ _not_ damn her to forever bound to a realm that was home to torture, malice and pain.

Hands at stern her hips to force a semblance of space, obstinately ignoring the lush pink curve of her mouth, he gazed imploringly up at her. "Lilith, _no._ I cannot allow you to throw away your chance at Elysia—"

"I don't care about that!" she cried and seized a handful of his shirt, small fingers clutching at his chest as though he might fade away if she didn't. Her tone was angry now, furious with feeling and with frustration, bordered on shuddery, weeping insult that he was refusing to take her seriously. "All my life you've taken care of me, even when no one else cared. You've saved my life more times than I can count, and even _now_ you treat me like I'm something precious—"

"Because you _are_—"

"Hush up, I'm not finished!" she ordered sternly, eyes flashing, and he meekly did as he was told, deciding it was better to obey and avoid unnecessary violence. On she went, delicate hands still full of his shirt, shaking now, trembling as vividly as her voice did. "You're the only notion of love I have, and the only one I've ever really wanted...and if you think I'm going to push that aside for an afterlife full of other dead people that I don't even know in a place I've never seen and won't miss_ because_ I haven't seen it, then you are _wrong!"_ Ducking her head, she quickly swiped at her eyes. "I finally have some way to repay you for all your kindness, and for caring."

Grayed lavender eyes tinged with blue, unable to suppress the instinctual affection that seized him tightly by the tender tissue of his heart. He had no smile for her, his face was drawn still and dark with brooding even while his hand smoothed over her dark hair with a gesture of calming, a soothing lullaby of touch. She slumped, inviting the effort extended to hug her to his chest, and he felt the beat of her pulse through her throat while she rubbed her cheek against the smooth plane between sternum and shoulder. Vacant and empty as the only measure of self-defense he had left, he stared out toward the window, the new morning, the glow of which brightened in time to the throb of the ache in his chest.

"Sweetling," he murmured, and the hard rasp of his voice scraped like sandpaper-velvet down her soul, "I require no payment for avarice, I don't deserve it. I do what I do for no other reason than my love for you, and _because_ I love you I can't help but feel that I should—"

"Azrael..." She had calmed a little, her words steady and the overflow of feeling back under control. "Didn't it ever occur to you that when you found the girl you wanted that she might be willing to do just about anything for you?" Sitting up where she was, tucked half in his lap and braced against his torso, she gave him another sure smile. "You gave up a life—broke laws, were punished, suffered—for me, among I don't know how many _other_ things...I want to do something for _you._" Her eyes softened as she glanced downward to let her focus rest on the hands she now had laid flat against his shoulders.

One long, agile hand lifted, fingertips trailing along the line of her temple and jaw in one long, sweet stroke. How one touch could hold such wistful longing and such morbid denial at one time was beyond her power to comprehend, and she looked up again in time to see him shake his head, pale hair feathery and soft, the set of his lips firm and unyielding. "You do not understand what you ask of me," he said, and it was lined with a rough, abrasive note that made her feel raw and edgy. "You are asking me to..." he shook his head again, stiff and stubborn. "I am sorry, it seems like such an easy fix, and for my own greed I might be tempted—God knows you have already managed to leash me like a dog. But I cannot."

He smiled at her, the mask thrown back up to shield her from his true mood. He did it so easily, it made her wonder just how long he'd had to feign that nothing at all was wrong, that everything was fine despite the reality that he was already half shattered inside just because he was infallibly certain that she was going to die and leave him. "It's going to be all right—"

All it took was a flash, and she was absolutely enraged. "You can't _do_ this to me!" His eyes grew wide, startled into flaring vibrant magenta for a lengthy, troubled second, staring at her as though he'd never seen anything quite like her before. She paid it no mind, but emptied her frustrations with the emphatic bluster of a tiny hurricane. "You can't just—how do you think it makes me feel, knowing my only choices are to sit here and _rot_ or change my freaking _species _status?"

Shifting uncomfortably, his lips parted, intending to tell her quite seriously that she was under no obligation to do anything for him and that she would not be _rotting_ at all. But she was on a tirade, a venting, verbal rampage that was not going to be quelled by placating words, no matter what he tried using to soothe her. Her temper wasn't truly that formidable; by comparison, most of the females he had known were of a pricklier nature than she was, but simply due to what and who she was, he found himself wilting under the lash of her attack. Like a chastised puppy, if he'd had a tail to droop and ears to flatten, they would undoubtedly have done so. Every syllable from her tongue whipped him with guilt, a rapid surge twisting back and forth between shame for being so careless as to have made her think she was being forced into a decision, and horror for having even introduced her to the situation in the first place.

"Yes," she admitted bluntly, making him start like a skittish cat when she smacked her fragile little fist into the arm of the couch, "the concept of never aging is...weird, and the idea of being some half-immortal thing scares me, but what scares me even _more_ is the idea of leaving you alone."

She ran the palm of one open hand over her face, resting her tired eyes for a few seconds with closed shadowed lids and letting out a shallow, discontented sigh. "I get it now, ok? I know why you were acting all happy and calm, and I even know it's fake." He opened his mouth a second time to protest, but she ploughed right on, not even allowing him to gather the breath to speak. "I know it's some show you're putting on because you don't want me to feel like I'm letting you down, because you don't want me to feel guilty...but I _already_ feel guilty because apparently you feel you have to hide from me instead of telling me the truth. We're supposed to be partners, and we're supposed to be honest with each other, or have I got the concept of our relationship wrong?"

He didn't say a word, he didn't have to in order to answer. _No, you're right,_ was scrawled across his face as legible as daylight. Still, he neglected to meet her eyes, keeping his stare fixed to some point over her shoulder, but she knew he was listening, riveted to whatever came out of her mouth, almost comically attuned to her. And hopefully, as she prayed to whoever might have been listening right around then with some manner of luck to bestow upon her, he was taking some of it in.

"I know you're nervous about it, and I guess I can understand that. I am too...but it'd be so much worse if you didn't. I've seen—" she bit her lip, a little hesitant to tell him about the photograph, not entirely sure he would take the news so well. She settled with a little exhale, shaking her head as if to say _never mind._ "I can't let that happen. And _you_ can't just let me off with some strained, probationary resignation after you've already swept in like this thing from the craziest dreams of my life, made me fall in love with you, and tell me eventually you'll just let me die and leave you to suffer when I could have _done _something about it!" And with that, she shut up, having run out of points to make.

She'd said her piece. It was his turn to take the floor.

She had very inappropriately-timed mental image of a chessboard before shoving it away, flushing a little for having been so outspoken and brash.

It didn't take him very long to gather his composure together, in fact he collected himself rather more quickly than she expected him to after her not-so-short little speech. With an airy breath, his eyes drifted closed, the shadowed lines at his brow smoothing and his mouth going soft under a reminiscent moment of self-reflection before those violet irises – still just a touch on the pale side – rested on her again. "How can I look at you and deny you anything?" He bent his head and kissed her cheek, lips lingering at the corner of her mouth, relishing the enticing scent of her skin and of her breath; deliciously alive, lusciously young,mouthwatering in all her breakable humanity and feminine temptation.

But he was utterly serious when he drew back, telling her gently, "let me explain to you what it is you are so avid to sell your soul in return for, _then_ you may choose." She listened patiently to him, knowing that no matter what he said, she knew her choice was already made. "If you do this, you will be a hybrid, which is different from a standard damned soul, but not by much. It is a degrading station to be in, meaning you will be seen as low-class and little better than a piece of flesh, but it also literally makes you my property, which means I can protect you from the sentences that would normally go to a human there. You will not truly be damned, but you may as well be. You may come back to the mortal realm with a body if you wish but your soul will be tied to hell, so the longer you stay here the weaker you will become and you will have to return to regain your strength, which takes a good amount of time."

When she nodded politely to show she understood, he continued; "you will be immortal in the basest sense. You will not age, nor will you ever take ill again, you will be slightly more difficult to injure, but while you will never die naturally, you can be killed. Strangulation, a blade, poison—it can kill you. And when a hybrid is killed, there is no afterlife. All that waits is the Darkness. " Speaking it seemed to bother him, like the sound of words coming from his tongue was enough to call the fate into awakening, and he paused, brief and slow, before reaching out and pulling her gently forward so that her head was tucked into the curve between his neck and the arc of his shoulder.

"Lilith, as perfect and amazing as it may seem, living forever is far from the dream it sounds." His hands were chilly at her back and cheek, but light, the contact itself warm by way of meaning and the offer of shelter. "Your friends, what is left of your family, they will grow old and change while you stay exactly as you are now. The places you knew will shift and reshape, time will alter the earth and the people, they will die, they will be replaced, and none of it will affect you. Everything you know and love that is here will eventually be gone. It is...a hard existence. It isn't even truly worthy of being called a life, not when all we do is linger, somewhere between ghosts and rock that never weathers on the outside. We just—_are_..." The weight of his hand flexed against her spine. "Inside, it takes a toll."

Such a grim subject, and it did part of what he'd meant it to. He wanted her to understand what she was getting herself into, he wanted her to know, to be prepared, to grasp the concept of all she would be forced to sacrifice for her choice. She sobered, content for the pensive moment to sit there, listening to the beat of his heart inside his chest, the rise and fall of the breath he didn't have to take, and considered.

_It will be dangerous._

So was life in New York as a pitiful human female. So was a life on earth at all, regardless of what anyone said, and she was already tangled in unearthly drama anyway. Besides...it would be hard no matter which way she chose to go. The important thing was to choose wisely, which path would be the least destructive, the least painful for the both of them. That alone was the sole reason why she was decided so quickly. Yes, the things he mentioned were dark and daunting, but she was almost certain half of that was his own personal experience, spoken from the heart of a lonely, longing man who just wanted to be loved. That was why she had to do it.

Nuzzling her cheek lightly against his throat, she said gently, "I understand." He heard the unspoken words that followed without her having to say them. _But I'll do it anyway, and if you won't help me, I'll find someone who will._

Urging her to look at him with the slide of a coaxing hand, he asked her gravely, "are you _sure?_"

She lifted her chin, defiantly daring him to try and convince her otherwise. "What do I have to do?"

Azrael sighed, a shallow breath of resignation that did the task of easing the uncertain want to restrain and refuse her request. He knew better than to fight her, for the all the good it would do, it just wasn't worth the battle, because he knew he couldn't really refuse her any wish; especially not one that his needy, thirsting personal bias already stood in favor for. A tiny slide of surrender, whispering as he gently pried her arms from around his neck, "_Ma'an kieh._ Follow me."

He led her to the bathroom, which was something of a surprise, and gracefully seated himself at the edge of the tub, reaching out to call on the flow of liquid, fingers under the running jet to test the temperature. "If you do not care to get your work clothes wet, you may change." Locking his attention to the task of filling the bathtub with warm water, he tried to still the thoughts that kept flitting across his brain. But he tried in vain, with brow furrowed and shifting eyes flickering back and forth from magenta to palest, crystal amethyst as he rolled up the sleeves of his shirt; unable to silence that birdlike little voice telling him oh so sweetly that this was a horrible error in judgment.

Never, in all of his unnumbered days, had he ever expected to be in this position. Not once had he ever paused to consider the power he had been instated with at creation; the ability to transfer never-ending life into a living human's soul and being. To use the power he knew only the five oldest of the angels possessed...well, he'd never had a need to. He had never even been curious. It was a power that one did not use casually, the use of which contained dire consequences often frowned upon by the greater population of heaven – himself included – and only to be used under the greatest of necessity. What did necessity mean? No one had ever asked, no one had ever inquired, and the process had only been done a few times in all of history; all of them done with official order to give them authority, and all of them performed by Uriel. Except for those few occasions, this process had never been undertaken.

And now, he had not only considered it fleetingly, but he had just agreed to perform the very magic that he morally frowned upon on the soul of his own ward...the woman he had protected for over nineteen years of mortal time. The woman who had almost literally saved him from suffocating in his own despair. The woman who had become his lover despite all certainty that she would never welcome him. The woman who had just consented to giving up everything she knew to cheat his own element in favor of the love she had for him.

When he had never expected to earn that love.

He would never have admitted it aloud, but he was afraid. _Very _afraid. The boon of immortality was a difficult procedure to perform, involving a certain amount of concentration, mental power, and skill via handling magics that were not entirely ones he was familiar with. If he were to slip up in just the barest way, neglect the tiniest detail, the results could be disastrous. He was frightened – terrified that he would make a mistake and accidentally kill the woman he loved. But this was what she wanted, so fear be damned, he was going to give it to her…and pray for all he was worth that he could get her through it successfully.

A soft hand rested on his shoulder and he lifted wary, haunted eyes to watch Lilith sit down beside him on the porcelain rim of the bathtub. She had not changed as he had suggested, merely stripped off her work blouse and skirt to leave herself in a thin white sleeveless shirt and light blue undergarments, a dramatic change in the level of modesty she usually presented in his presence. Had he been in any other frame of mind, he would have teased her about her choice in dress; perhaps let his hands wander up the sloping length of her bare legs, brush the loose tresses of dark hair back from her shoulder to press his lips to her neck, breathe in the painfully addictive scent at her delicate throat like the drug it was. He would have whispered how much he loved her and listened to the racing of her heartbeat, feel the tremble of the nerves beneath her soft skin.

But he didn't feel up to any of it now. Gripped by reality, his body and mind were rendered motionless and cold by the awful, streaking fear that he would not be able to grant the spoken wish. Unable to bring himself to tease, he shut off the water with a simple flick of his wrist as the liquid lapped at the porcelain sides just two inches from the brim. Eyes flickering violently from shade to shade of purple, he shifted his gaze to meet her bright green stare. She was nervous; he could feel it as clearly as he could read it in the shape of her pretty face, the way she wrung her own hands like one would twist water from a dishcloth. Pain lashed him hard, a stabbing hurt that ripped through his chest, cued by thought of the risk he was letting her take for him; and, unable to bear the lack of touch any longer, he grabbed her, pulled her to him, cradling her against his chest with all the desperation of a cursed man.

Lilith let Azrael crush her smaller body into his own, sinking into the strong embrace of his grip, reveling in his power and his gentleness. She tucked her face in the hair at his nape, inhaling the smooth, calming smell of soap, the rich undertone of male that so reminded her of dark chocolate and spice. His lips brushed her temple, absorbing a deep, shuddering breath before he pressed, forceful in his need to be certain; "are you absolutely sure that there is nothing I can say—nothing I can do to change your mind?"

She couldn't help but smile at the tone he used, one so lacking the strength of will he would have needed to turn her away from what he clearly had labeled as mad, spur-of-the-moment impulse. Her arms slipped around his waist, slender palms sliding up his back to rest flat against the spot where she knew his wings resided in their stationary form; and she pulled back, just enough to look at him, she gazed up at him with that same soft, devoted spark in her eyes. Affectionate determination beneath muted assent. "Yes."

There was pain in his face then, concern, fear, a quick, shallow gather of resilience before his supply ran dry. "Darling, once you do this there is no going back—"

The very tips of her fingers laid gently against his mouth, stilling his final attempt to diverge her from her decision. She watched his expression melt into desolate fall of defeat and felt her chest compressing as though bound or constricted – pain for pain, her hurt derived directly from his. She could tell he didn't want to do this, but she was also almost positive that he would thank her later. He needed her to be brave, needed her to have the strength to do what he would not out of respect for her mortality.

Brushing her hand from his face with tender consideration, he leaned forward to touch a soft kiss to her lips, too chaste to be called anything but affectionate; and withdrew to free her from his embrace. Forcing himself to be calm, forcing the internal warning chimes to be silent as he beat back the instinct to protect her, even from herself, he gestured to the bathtub. "Sit here," he instructed, to which she obeyed immediately, swinging her legs over the rim to slide down into a sitting position, up to her lowest ribs in pleasantly warm water that instantly soaked through the hem of her shirt and underwear. Strangely to her eyes, it seemed unnaturally clear, the ripples of jostled motion stilling much more quickly than usual bathwater did. She shrugged, putting it out of her mind, and turned her attention back to Azrael for further orders.

The angel had adjusted his position and now gracefully straddled the side of the tub with one suddenly bare foot in the water with her, denim slacks already sopping up to the knee. "Now," he instructed, voice still soft and guarded, "take a deep breath and lie back." He didn't seem to be concentrating on the words that came out of his own mouth, but appeared distant, lost in another world completely, his eyes slightly glazed as if deeply lodged in thought.

Though her better judgment might have protested, she obeyed without question, filling her lungs with air and leaning back until her head rested a little awkwardly against the floor of the basin. Water rushed to cover her torso and head with a clear liquid blanket, her legs bent at the knees in order to fit all of her upper body. Even edging toward the petite side, the bathtub was not the largest of places to try and fit into. Well, no matter. So far, so good.

A gentle pressure on her sternum brought her notice to the fact that Azrael had laid his hand over her chest, as she saw when she opened her eyes, and she smiled at him to convey that she wasn't afraid. He met her eyes for a brief instant – a pale, wary lilac – before the lids flickered to veil them from her sight. He did not, however, return her smile; his elegant lips remained a firm, straight, serious line, a severity echoed in the rest of him. Every muscle in his body was tense, alert, wound tighter than a spring, drawn as taut as a bowstring. Yet the hand, palm flat against her breast bone, was as gentle as could be.

As she watched, she could feel her air supply run out irritatingly fast, her lungs already starting to complain about the lack of nourishment. She held for a few moments more until the absence of oxygen rose to an uncomfortable, prickling level, after which she tried to hold on a bit longer still. He hadn't said how long she needed to be there, but she found that she simply didn't have the lungs to stay there any longer. Weak, weary, and feeling the lingering mark of her earlier distress still picking at her heart, she could tell that having neither ate nor slept the previous night had taken a blow to her usual physical stamina, not that it was saying much. She wasn't really much of a swimmer anyway. She moved to sit up, her stomach muscles flexing to perform as she requested…and discovered that she couldn't move. The solid pressure of Azrael's hand had kept her firmly in place.

Her eyes widened, both surprise and abrasive confusion sparkling at the back of her consciousness. What was he playing at? She needed to breathe, he knew that – she _knew_ he knew that – so why was he holding her down? Maybe he hadn't felt it, his eyes were still closed after all. Again she pushed, harder the second time, trying to force herself into a sitting position in order to get to the oxygen she needed; and again he stopped her, pressing her down, keeping her back cemented to the surface crammed against her shoulder blades. Lilith gripped the sides of the tub in hopes of receiving some leverage to combat the strength he had at his disposal, at least enough to draw his attention to the fact that she needed up, if not to shove him off. But he continued to deny her, the added, white-knuckled boost did nothing to help her.

_What are you _doing_?_

It was burning now, the delicate, sensitive tissues in her lung screaming, piteous with agony; but no matter how hard she shoved at him, he would not let her up. She gripped his wrist, and he pried her hand off with his free one. She tried slapping at his forearm, but he didn't appear to feel it. Purple eyes still closed, his lips moved, speaking words she couldn't hear for the chaotic roaring in her ears. She hit harder, trying to pry his fingers from where they remained splayed across her chest – but she was feeble and weak in comparison. None of it did anything to his iron grip.

Panic drove the craze for air. Brain and sense depleted by stress, all traces of her mission and what the point of this torture was erased, she grabbed for any part of him she could reach; tearing at his arms, shoulders, chest, stomach, her fingers scraping for a good grip. She needed to hurt him, clawed with her nails to cause pain, to jolt him out of whatever psychotic trance he was in that was causing him to hold her under the water. Her tearing fingers gouged against tightly corded arm muscles, ripping an open cut below one elbow, but he barely moved. Frustrated, terrified, wildly desperate, she flailed; stirring up the water until it frothed and foamed like no bathwater should have. Her bare feet slid against the wet, slick surface of the porcelain. Her knee slammed hard on the edge of the faucet and a sharp, painful twinge shot up her leg. She bucked again, thrashing like a cornered animal, blindly trying to get her leg back far enough to kick him.

_Make him stop…make the burning _stop_! _

Almost unconsciously, he pulled slightly backward, turning his head away from her assault and grappling for her frenzied, raking hands to prevent her from getting near his closed eyes. An acknowledgement at last...but one very different to what she had been hoping to gain. The foot he had in the tub shifted, slinging over her wildly kicking legs and stilling her panicked thrashing by pressing down on her with the far superior weight of his own body.

The force jostled her, jerked at her torso, startling her into succumbing to the instinctive urge to cry out – her mouth opened, and water came rushing forth, pouring, sucked deep into her already agonized lungs. She choked, inhaling more liquid, the substance so sweetly trying to take the place of air to her parched throat and starving blood, and rejected with bitter resentment as her body tried to right itself in vain.

She was drowning...

She was dying and he knew it.

For some bizarre reason, perhaps a natural slip to giving up to the more powerful element, the truth of it hit her with nothing but utmost serenity. Her struggles slowly ceased, her muscles loose and growing so very heavy while her vision started to grow dark. There was no pain now, no notion of pressure in her chest, no ache in her nose and mouth where the tissues rent and tore. Nothing would ever touch her again.

Images and colors flared before her eyes, filling the black with lines and shapes that seemed vaguely familiar, rearranging in her brain before dark, empty space closed in around her, muffling the heavy, descending pound of her own heartbeat. Slowing down, growing incoherent and obsolete to the ultimate peace in the world.

And all she really wanted was sleep…

*

_Nine ways of Death,  
In a field of black stone and water.  
Empty of life._

*

He felt her shocked eyes alight upon his face, felt her try to sit up beneath his hand and pressed her back to the cream-shaded porcelain. She tried to pull at his wrist and he reached down to shake off the grip, though no sooner had he done this then she was back at it, slapping at his arm. Poor child, she could not understand that this was what she had wanted. This was what she had asked of him. He ignored her force (it didn't hurt him, after all) and pinned his focus to the bright light that was her mortal soul, visible when he closed off his physical sights and opened his internal, angelic ones.

He was Death now, personal core forgotten, overwhelmed by the otherworldly force he was without it. Anchorless, soulless, breathless, without any form or guidance but his own sense-driven knowledge and instinct. Her essence was bright with youth and spirit, a clean white tinted with the barest shade of green. Mortality in its true, pure brilliance, beautiful, alluring, compelling, seductive even. The lure had little affect to Death, grounded purpose and the objective view of an elemental kept her from dragging him to his rational, real senses and panicking.

And panic is just what he would do, which was why he kept his real eyes firmly closed. Had he seen her struggling against the hands that were stone-set on keeping her under, his hands, he would have snapped and forgotten his promise to her. She would never forgive him for that.

"I am Mortality, fire and water."

Lilith's hand was on his arm, her nails digging into his physical flesh, ripping his flesh open in her attempt to pain him, trying to make him grant her access to the oxygen her human body craved. He turned his face away from her reach, his empty hand feeling blindly for her wrists, arms, anything so that he could keep her clawing, desperate fingers from their target. If she distracted him, he ran the risk of killing her. He caught her and held tight, feeling with a faraway kind of knowledge the blood that rose form his flesh as her fingernails sank deep grooves into his wrists, closely monitoring the amount of force he pressed to her chest to make sure her delicate bones were not cracked due to her own frantic writhing.

"I am flesh of your child, wielder of the Hands of Blood and Mercy."

Then she resorted to kicking, refusing to be dismissed, her legs whipping the conduit liquid to a thick froth that spilled over the sides of the tub. That would not do. If she didn't remain submerged, the process would fail. Trying to buck, trying to throw him off as an unwilling horse would its rider she thrashed, wildly twisting her limbs and back to divert the grip that was pressing her to the bottom of the bathtub and keeping her head under the water. He held her firm, unyielding, bearing down on her fragile body to curb her to his will, pinning the violently protesting legs in place to keep her from kicking.

His lips barely moved, but the words that came from them crackled and seared with power, the language a mixture of the one he knew and the raw, acrid remnant of the First creation, stronger than the burn of the sun's birth. "I invoke thee, _obey._"

He felt the jarred catch of her mouth, subconsciously aware that her lungs were taking in water, and felt something inside him stir, alarmed, the part of him that recalled what was happening flushing with fear. But knew better than to act; this was part of the ritual and to break it now would not help her. Doing his damndest to ignore the warning flare of pain in his chest, he proceeded, voice singing out with a hushed, lulling murmur that made the water still even despite the girl who continued to writhe and convulse within it. The air around him changed, a subtle adjustment in depth, growing thicker and pressing tighter to the mouth and nose that cut off from solid breath.

_Just a little while longer…hold on._

"Transmute—_A'anwyn... _Beryl, green, Liliacae. "

She was so weak now, her struggles wound low and useless, shoving helplessly at his shoulder before the touch of a wilting hand slipped down his chest, unable to manage its own weight. Heavy limbs; her eyes would close soon and her pain would be ebbing away, the burning in her lungs and throat would not be beating at her mind anymore. Death was just, if not always quick, and banished worldly pain by disconnecting the nerves' attachments to the brain. There was no way she could fight him now with fingers that slid loosely along the edge of his side and over the thigh slung over her knees. His hand moved upward to locate her neck, circling the slender column with his fingers to displace some of the pressure, pushing through the Tests of the Maker that licked at him like eager hungry flames, sweat beading down his spine and slick across his brow.

Pass through the fires of hell, and he would be allowed to bring in another soul. But he also had to keep his charge _alive, _and that was the difficult part. Her soul's light was already growing dim, beginning to flicker like a guttering candle, dangerously close to snuffing. He could _not _let that light go out. Pulling a thread of power from the deeper recesses of his personal store, he wound the strand around her heart, forcing it to beat. But there was only so much he could do once the soul decided to give in, and she was quick to surrender to the compelling promise of rest.

Fading...fading, so slowly now, and getting steadily fainter.

_Damn it!_

The back of her hand fell to the porcelain floor, the resounding clang as sharp and echoing as a clap of thunder to his sensitive ears. "_Ave._" He cut the tie, and with all the strength he possessed – physical and mental alike – he pulled upward.

With a force like the shattering tumult of a gale the water pulled with him, surging high with his momentum only to slam back down with a muffled roar. Water, clear and cool, spread across the cold stone surface, a shimmering glass-smooth wave as Azrael fell backward, his grip breaking while the trance snapped and he went crashing to the floor.A grimace twisted his face, a mild flare of pain in his back unaided by magic since he had just drained a good deal of it. He sat up gingerly, shoving liberally drenched hair out of his eyes in order to glance toward the bathtub. But there was no bathtub anymore. It had been replaced by a large, nearly coffin-shaped basin carved entirely from a piece of solid black stone.

The very same obsidian that formed the floor and walls of the hellish transportation room.

Having been pulled with him, Lilith had freed herself from the water and hung limply over the side of the basin – her body rocking with coughs, choking up the water that had been sucked into her lungs and taking deep gulps of air between gasps. Unbeknownst to her, Azrael sighed his relief, lifting his face to mutter a hushed prayer of gratitude for his success. Sending a mortal soul to the very brink of death and then pulling them back out just before the life split from their body was not an easy thing to do. But somehow he had managed it without serious mishap. Lilith was still alive and had gotten her wish. _Thank you Mother,_ he entreated vehemently, relieved beyond his ability to voice.

Rolling to his knees, he reached forward to help the shivering, shock-scared girl out of the now empty container. She was as light as a silk scarf in his arms while he assisted her in lifting her legs over the edge of the stone, and fell easily to the floor, spilling weakly over his lap, leeched of strength and shivering. Sharp, inhuman eyes took in the thin, water-soaked fabric of the garment that clung to her torso, a milky, transparent gauze against her skin, displaying every curve, every plane of her flesh. Her skin held a faint, unearthly gleam to it now, a soft sparkle with any movement she made, smooth and soft as silk, pale as moonlight; a gift for the new hybrid. Her cheeks were flushed, her lips a rosy pink and slightly parted as she inhaled with the shaky insecurity of a newborn deer; her wet hair stuck to her cheeks, neck, and shoulders, the rise and fall of her chest still deep with the catch of the breath she no longer required for sustenance.

At that instant, he wanted nothing more than to press her to the ground and make love to her, to strip her lovely form of waterlogged fabric and touch her shimmering flesh, to taste the newfound, exhilarating life that lingered on those lush, pretty lips. _Sweet, beautiful daughter of the earth… _Anything to ease the terrible aching, to celebrate the relief that she was alive and his. But that was irrational. It would be a while yet before she recovered from being nearly drowned and yanked back into life like an apple plucked from a tree. He exerted a strict, firm mental order to control himself. She didn't deserve to be manhandled and ravaged on a hard, wet stone floor, and he could be patient. It was good exercise.

Catching his breath, he slid a pair of gentle, lenient fingertips along her scalp, the base of her neck and throat – feeling her pulse returning strong, banishing the pounding he could feel trying to develop in her temples with a small, cooling thread of magic, checking her head and face for any trauma that may have been caused by her journey to and from the edge of death. Her chest rose and fell more slowly, calmed into regularity, and overall she seemed completely well, if a bit stunned and slightly winded. The examination turned tender, skimming lightly down her cheek with the backs of fine white knuckles, feathering softly as he looked down at her, at the dark, lacy pattern of her eyelashes against pale skin, the sweet curve of her lips beneath the delicate line of her nose; lying across his lap as though there was no place else she could belong more completely.

"Hot damn—I didn't think you'd actually do it."

At the sound of Beelzebub's silvery voice, he craned his head back to watch the prince wave a flippant hand to banish the water causing the onyx floor to shimmer and gleam with wetness, then bend to lay a set of large, fluffy red-gold towels within the angel's easy reach. A somewhat wry smile played at the corner of Azrael's mouth. "I did not intend to. She insisted."

"I believe that, actually," this said with the emphasis of a low snigger of laughter. "'Figured she'd be able to stand up to you sooner or later. It'll be good for you." Tawny eyes flashed with humor, and the demon crouched down beside his friend with a crooked smile to accompany the angel's, a wicked tilt of lip and just the barest flash of a shiny white fang. He glanced down at the girl still fighting to recover from shock, a low, long whistle sliding off his tongue (though he kept it quiet so as not to disturb her) as he examined her – soaked with water, dark hair and fabric stuck to her skin, so much of that slim, supple body exposed. "Sweet jesus..."

Azrael rolled his eyes, the expression composed of feigned irritation, and lipped, "yes, yes, shameless little libertine." Taking hold of the topmost towel he wrapped it gingerly around Lilith's wet, shivery body, cocooning her in the fluffy fabric. Warmth at this stage was almost crucial, it was important to keep the heartblood hot else the new immortal succumb to the shock and find themselves stuck in a coma-like state; like a living sculpture without need of nourishment, but cold and loveless as stone encrusted with ice.

"What, you're not gonna tell me to stay away from your woman?"

Royal purple flashed upward to meet slit-pupiled irises of molten gold. Though the angel's gaze was calm and touched with friendly humor, there was a steely, piercing tinge of warning just visible within his smiling eyes. "Not at all," he said, the lilt of his voice a cautionary purr. "I trust that I don't have to." For a moment, a wavering line of strain passed between them, the friendly challenge from a natural miscreant meeting the unshakable instinct of a guardian fortified by the possessive warning of a lover, a light tingling of rivalistic energy. The next moment, the angel winked, the warding air evaporating into a somewhat tired smile. "Now shoo."

Beelzebub laughed, carefully muted out of consideration for the new hybrid's tender ears. "Yes Sir," he mock-saluted, turning to the door which led out of the transportation room. "Oh, we installed a door between your suite and the rooms next to it for her."

"And I thought you said this was unexpected..." Azrael let the statement hang in the air, open for an answer as though it were a question.

The demon prince scoffed. "It _was._ Blame Mastema and his old-man-who-knows-all-that-has-to-do-with-romance syndrome. I swear you two have this ESP thing going on. I don't know how he knows you so well, but he does. I just followed his suggestions. He says _do this_ and I ask why, then he says _just because_, so I say _why the hell not?_" Shrugging, he cracked a grin and waved to his friend, cheerful and brimming with mischief. "Ta!" Humming something that sounded vaguely like a funeral dirge, he waltzed out the door, slim body held in a strange, crooked parody of formal stiffness.

"Thank you," Azrael called over his shoulder before the demon could conduct a full retreat, smiling in spite of himself – touched by the gesture of kindness and affection from his old friend. A room was nothing monumental, but it was enough to remind him of his allies, no matter how mild. Just then, Lilith stirred, trying to sit up even though her weakened body barely had the energy to support itself. He helped her, wrapping a generous arm around her back to support her as she lifted a hand to her head as though trying to regain some sense of balance to counter the dizziness playing with her eyes. "Easy," he cautioned softly, "that was a difficult ordeal for a human soul to go through, your strength is not due to return for a while."

Her eyes flickered open, green irises finding weak focus on the room of polished black stone that surrounded her. Confusion took over her tired expression, a clouded puzzlement, as if she had expected something very different, and she wet her lips with a slow dart of her tongue before speaking, haltingly, her voice slow and weary, "what is this place?"

"You are in the transport room, a chamber specially designed to accommodate the transfer of souls from realm to realm. The only one of its kind in all of hell that can take incoming human spirits."

Her brow furrowed, still looking utterly confused. "Hell?" Widening under the shocking grip of horror, her eyes went cold and pale; she stammered with panic, her words coming with the flighty fright of a child who was being blamed unjustly for committing some ungodly wrong. "W-why am I…what did I do to get here? I didn't mean to, whatever it was!" Yet while she struggled as if to lurch away from his hold, her body was weakened by the procedural draining. He barely even had to exert any effort to hold her still in his arms, preventing any accidental injury while he stared at her, as liberally lost as she strangely seemed, until she was forced merely to turn her head and look at him.

They had been wide before, but she managed to extend the roundness of those pretty forested eyes even more, bright green chilled with fear, oddly blank of the knowing, intelligent light they should have held. It was as if she was looking at someone else completely, not at him, who she had come to know and trust. "Who…" She pushed away from him, her small hands bracing weakly against his chest, trying to force some space as though she feared he would hurt her. Her face shifted and changed with emotions, flickering with a strange mixture of curious intrigue and downright alarm as she eyed his drenched clothes, dripping hair, and powerful form. Taking note of the strong male arms that curled around her body, holding her so intimately cradled atop the flesh of his thighs, she let out a tiny noise of distress, which scraped raw and honest at his ears.

She was truly _afraid_ of him...like she didn't even... And then it hit him. A mortified groan pushed between his lips as he realized what was wrong, swearing vividly under his breath at the sheer amount of folly.

He had pulled her back from the edge of death too quickly. Being thrown back into life so fast had the tendency to drive a part of human memory from the mind, a warped form of amnesia that was common in the newly dead. She didn't appear to remember forcing him to transfer her soul from the earth into the darkness of hell; in fact, she didn't seem to remember him at all. An unfortunate and frustrating mistake…but he was thankful, because of all the flaws he could have made, the one he _had_ made was not permanent. Sooner or later, something would trigger a spark of memory to break her out of the defensive mental locks, as was typical. For now, he just needed to be patient, watch her carefully, make sure she didn't hurt herself, and perhaps try to help her regain her memories if he could.

Distinctly aware that his ward was still in a state of hyperventilating panic, he very slowly (so as not to alarm her further) eased his hold from around her waist, allowing her to slide limply from his lap while holding up his hands to show her he meant her no danger. "Have no fear. You did nothing wrong, and I will not harm you." He offered her a gentle smile, putting every scrap of love and good intent he possessed into the gift. "You truly cannot remember me?" She shook her head hastily, still peering up at him with wide, frightened eyes, so very reminiscent of the little girl he remembered cowering beneath her father's abusive tirades. That was rather upsetting, to think that she would show him the same terror she'd shown that brute of a man... His movement was coaxing and careful as he held out a hand to her, murmuring, "I swore to protect you, my blood for yours. Trust me like you did when you knew me—your guardian angel."

He held perfectly still, hoping beyond hope that she would be able to see past her own residual childlike fear of her surroundings so that she could take in his appearance, knowing full well that his true angelic body was now visible to her, hoping she might be able to see that he meant her no ill. In the mortal realm, his true form (the soul form, as it was called) was only visible to those he visited on their deathbeds, those entering the underworld already. For her – young, whole, healthy, and steadily alive – he had never had cause to display how he truly looked, the way his mother had made him, an angel of the heavens even in the dank, desolate black of hell.

Though he still dripped with water, the regality in his posture was not lessened in the slightest; white-skinned and pale-haired, with eyes that could have been chips of amethyst drawn pale with genial concern. He was a son of Heaven, a majestic example of the standard of elegance the Creator held, but he was also unsure what the effect of that brilliance might do. Would the angelic radiance dazzle her into trusting him…or just the opposite? She did _seem_ to relax after his comment about being her guardian, but he could not be sure. "Do you believe me?" he pressed her, voice soft, imploring, pleading for the blessing of trust.

Struggling with some internal conflict raging within her own haphazardly-pieced mind, she looked uncertain. "I—" She clutched the towel tighter to her body, eyes downcast and frankly puzzled. "I want to. I feel like I'm supposed to believe you, like I'm safe. I think I should know you, but I don't remember…" an apologetic frown crossed her pretty face, upset by her own lack of memory to the point of being rendered quite distraught by it.

He moved forward, extending the aid of soft, tender hands to help her get shakily to her feet. "You will in time, dear," he reassured. "I promise. Now, you are exhausted, let us find you some dry clothes and a warm bed."

Faithful to whatever it was inside her that retained the faintest traces of trust, Lilith let him steer her across the cold, still mildly damp stone floor, their bare feet padding almost silently against the dark rock. She followed obediently, guided by his touch to the small of her back and the supportive grip under her forearm, while he made his way down a dimly lit hallway that seemed entirely constructed of twists and harrowing turns. The entire building, or world, or whatever it was, seemed to be singularly carved out of the same onyx stone as the transportation room, seamlessly bound together against all laws of nature, no cracks, no lines, no mortar. Doors were spaced randomly along its walls, as many as there were pathways leading off to either side toward separate wings, flickering flames illuminating golden shadows behind elaborate sconces of frosted glass.

They must have passed hundreds of doors and hallways. Her tired eyes seemed to blur with the unadorned walls and cold black glitter of polished obsidian, the lights too bright for comfort and the path too convoluted for remembering. A sharp right turn was taken into a small corridor, and the angel beside her tucked her close to his side, holding her against his own steady figure while reaching out to draw a complex, arcane symbol of what looked like white fire over the front of the wooden door that blocked the way forward.

It was dark, elaborately carved wood, etched with symbols and scrollwork of a nature she didn't recognize, and the symbol that burned like a brand upon its surface flashed violet as soon as his fingertip parted with the wood. There was a series of subtle clicks, the quiet, muted sounds like the gears of several locks being systematically undone, and he pressed his palm flat to the door, pushing it open to allow entry. Compliantly, she followed the coaxing touch to her back and stepped inside, staring around with something akin to surprised delight at the room.

Her toes automatically curled into the soft burgundy rug that cushioned a dark, cherry wood floor, half with pleasure in the plush texture and half for sheer awed relish upon seeing walls formed solidly of bookshelves separated by two doors on opposite sides of the room, and a large, dark stone fireplace and mantle. There was no fire, which would have been cheerful and warm, but the large, paper-strewn, cherry desk sported a bright flame caged within a fuel-devoid lamp, casting the deep green upholstery of the twin armchairs at desk and hearth with rich, lush color. A room like this belonged to a scholar, a lover of peace and knowledge and comfort; and the subconscious analysis caused her still somewhat tense shoulders to relax.

Yet her wayward attention strayed back to the bookshelves, crammed near to bursting with leather and silk-bound volumes, ribbon-tied scrolls, and stacked files of documents browned and crinkled with age. Her fingers itched to scan the multitudes of spines and labels, a thirst for information that perhaps she had not yet explored rising like hunger inside her, wanting to touch those wondrous, glorious books. But her guide ignored the room completely, instead helped her to cross it and pushed open the door to the immediate right, which led into a beautiful bedroom.

Almost the polar opposite of the book-laden study, this room was all light, golden oak flooring cushioned with plush, deep azure carpets with soft, pale forget-me-not blue traceries of vines and flowers. The bed, pushed to the far corner, was a twin sleigh furnished with pastel blue sheets and a snowy white comforter, and piled high with fluffy pillows tinted with a shade of mint green. The pale blue walls had been tastefully hung with paintings both brightly and softly colored, and a wardrobe of gleaming oak accompanied by a mirrored vanity stood off to the left, alongside yet another door, its contents hidden.

"This will be your room," Azrael told her, voice as soft as velvet behind her. He gestured to the open door, stating, "that leads to the bath, if you desire one, and there are clothes in the wardrobe for you." He led her to the straight-backed chair before the table and mirror and helped her to sit, examining her face with observant eyes while she settled slightly awkwardly. Catching the unspoken question hidden underneath the forefront of her somewhat blank expression, he latched hopefully onto it, noticing that, whatever she might have forgotten, she remembered that she adored her books. "Once you have rested, you are more than welcome to help yourself to anything in my library."

She looked up at him then, a fraction of her old smile at her lips as she murmured softly, "thank you."

He smiled back at her, his internal, glowing aura of light brightening in response to her spark of happiness, pleased that he had managed to give her some amount of comfort. "Feel free to explore any of the other rooms in the suite as well, if you like," she followed the motion of his hands toward the door leading back toward the study with a tired kind of curiosity, "but I must ask you not to go through the main door alone, for your safety. If you need anything at all, come find me, all right?" Her assent came quickly in the form of nodding agreement, quite content to comply with his wishes. She had no desire whatsoever to wander around _hell _on her own.

Then a hand touched her cheek, his fingers against her skin, and the lift of her eyes met his with a flash of blue-violet and green just as the edge of his thumb brushed her lower lip. An unsettling flutter hacked at the walls of her stomach under the gentle touch, and while it felt completely foreign at first, there was a hesitant taste of something familiar to the tingling warmth that flushed her body. But she couldn't quite place it; the memory that should have aided and advised her was a blank, empty hole within the recesses of her mind. She felt as though she should remember this, connect this moment and feeling with something else…something similar. She should _know_ why she felt such a guilty pleasure in the contact with the flesh and gaze of this man, a stranger who seemed so much more real to her than any stranger had the right to.

But she didn't.

The breath at the back of her mouth caught as those gently callused fingertips trailed just a few inches downward to rest at the delicate hollow of her throat. Such a soft, longing caress, so light, yet energy blazed and sparked like electricity flowing between fire and metal, jerking her by the insides so roughly that she barely had time to register it before, just as quickly as it had come, the connection was suddenly gone.

He moved backward, hand falling away from the tingling slice of skin, fingers to his temple to offer a brief gesture of reverence before he stepped back over the threshold, and closed the door for her. A swift, uncomfortable end to a moment with its very own eternity.

A soft rush brought her breath back, almost sad for the liberation from the company of the strange, beautiful man. It left her weary and wilting in her chair, aching for sleep and finding her wet clothes exceedingly bothersome. Standing somewhat shakily, but managing to stand on her own two feet, she padded to the wardrobe and pulled the doors almost cautiously open. It was quite seriously as though a section of the rainbow had been pressed into silk, satin, velvet, and chenille and then hung over hangers laid out for her use – clothing of a quality and make she was certain she had never so much as set eyes on before. Reaching up to touch the silver braid that trimmed the sheer sleeve of a gown made of deepest green satin, she gave an awing exhale. Such beautiful clothes…she wouldn't dare wear them. What if she ripped something or got them dirty? Such things were just not meant for someone like her.

There was an array of shoes she purposely ignored lined up like footwear soldiers along the bottom, and a drawer filled with an assortment of socks and hose and sheer, silky stockings, even garters of fine, embroidered lace, also passed by with little tired interest. The next drawer housed a variety of nightwear, from which she selected a long gown of a white, airy material with string sleeves and a modest neckline, mainly because she wanted sleep and it was the first thing she saw. Besides, it would be dry, and she had little doubt that with all those blankets and fluffy comforter, anything heavier would be no less than stifling.

The last drawer was the largest and, to her flustered surprise, contained underclothes. How anyone had been able to estimate the size and style of undergarments she preferred was anyone's guess…but was a wee bit awkward to think about. However, the range of styles and materials didn't merely stop at unadorned, conservative cotton. While pawing somewhat bewilderedly through the assortment (and disrupting the tidy, folded piles) she happened upon several garments that frankly shocked her, including a pair of corsets, complete with real steel boning, and one or two pairs of underwear that seemed almost absurdly skimpy. Blushing faintly, she grabbed a pair of plain powder pink and hastily shut the drawer.

Peeling off the wet clothes and tossing them into the empty basket at the end of the bed, she pulled on the dry replacements and felt almost instantly better. Her shivers started to slow and recede, the lingering aftertaste of fear and confusion soothed by the warmth and the generous gift of the pretty room. There were combs in the vanity's drawers, with which she detangled her messy hair, ridding it of snarls fit for a blackberry thicket until it hung smooth and straight, if still a little damp, down her back, and headed right for the bed.

The mattress sank beneath her weight, lush and welcoming with just the right amount of firmness she liked. Exhaustion swept over her like a wave, pressing down upon every limb, her eyelids heavy and threatening to glue themselves shut as if contact with the bed had been some kind of trigger. A yawn forced its way to freedom, insistent and demanding, and she obeyed the physical impulse to lie down, pulling one of the soft, squashy pillows to her chest and resting her cheek against a second. While sleep came, it was strange and fretful, as if something was missing. Something that should have brought warmth to her oddly chilled heart. Some calming, affectionate presence that should have been beside her.

Whatever that something was, it wasn't there. But sleep was a relentless master, so she succumbed regardless of the curious missing comfort. Oblivious to the soft sigh of mixed weariness, longing, and relief that was breathed outside her door, she slept.

A sleep empty of dreams.

* * *

**:D gawd that went more quickly than I anticipated...JOY!**

**I did some fixing and some adding, because this thing was majorly, shudder-worthy bad just a few days ago, probably because it's an old chapter. OLD. Next chapter...I don't know when I'll get it up. We'll see what happens!**

**So, fortunately, no one screamed at me last chapter about what a cliché I am. How about now? Actually, now that I think about it, this isn't as clichéd as it could be...and like I said, the problems don't end with this. I've got four more books to go, how could they possibly end? And, obviously I've just added another twist. Bet you didn't see that one coming. Along with everything else. Bah. I'm awful.**

**...all the same, please don't hate me!**

**I'm somewhat curious as to how many people I threw off with this chapter, specifically the drowning part. Also, those of you who caught the movie-reference, bravo and a salute; that was what inspired this chapter to begin with. At first it was just because I was a nerd and thought "whoa...COOL!!! -uses-" but once I started filling out the world and the rules more thoroughly, I came to realize just how realistic this actually was to the way I'd crafted it. Of course, I can't be sure how much of that was influenced by my wanting to keep this in here X] I do that more than I should.**

**But, this has evolved quite a bit since I first wrote it, and I've given you quite a lot of information, and even some hints about what's to come...though they're pretty archaic and piecy. Constantly a work-in-progress.**

**-le sigh-**

**Anyways, I'll leave it there. Kindly review on your way out, pretty, pretty please! :)**

**See you next chapter!!**


	37. Aquatic Radiance

**Chapter 55: Aquatic Radiance**

Recommended Listening: "What Sound" by Lamb

* * *

_It hadn't been the first time she'd taken pills to ease her sleep; far from it, but none of the incidents before had ended in slowing the heart to a stop and the brain to starve itself of oxygen until her body lay dead and empty as a husk. Just one or two or three too many; enough to strip the skin of color and to send the gears of organs and bodily processes grinding to a halt. The woman was already dead by the time he came to her bedside, the whispered apparition of a shadow in the night, her spirit standing a few feet away from where her shed body lay flat and stiff and unmoving. As if she had automatically grasped what had happened, she stared quite calmly, almost pensive and thoughtful down at her own face, mirrored by the transparency of the inner being that had broken free from the cage of mortality. A rarity among humans, to take their passing with such composure. Refreshing, even._

_She had been lovely in her youth, he remembered that, if a little vaguely due to attentions spent on other things at the time he'd had to appraise her. The past few years had taken a great toll on her physically, setting deep lines in her face and aging her prematurely, stress and guilt and other such destructive emotions having wreaked livid havoc upon the natural lay of beauty her spirit figure still managed to retain. Still she looked older than she had, but less withered, despite the fact that this doctored death had taken her before she had reached the age of thirty-two. _

_Seeing her there, from where he lingered, cloaked and masked from both sight and sound, he could tell that half of that cool resignation had come before the cold had gripped her body. This woman, while perhaps not directly _asking_ for it, had not been opposed to Death visiting to steal her soul away. It was in the purse of her mouth, the way she regarded herself with a grim kind of satisfaction. Glad, even._

_"I know you're there," she informed him, her tone blunt and subdued, "I can't see you, but I can feel you." He didn't answer, merely observed the way she lifted her head and surveyed the room around her with a pair of wide brown eyes, the tilt to her chin stubborn and certain. Her mouth quirked with an ironic kind of half-smile, only partially-lined with humor, and she smoothed a spirit-fleshed hand down her shirt with a mild shake of her dark head. "You still have the strongest aura I've ever touched."_

_Ah, she was a soul-seer. That would explain her calm in the face of his presence, and why she could still sense him through the light shielding; for concealing the physical shape did nothing to depress the spiritual pressure, which was what she felt. All the same, what he found interesting was her use of the word _still._ He _still _had a strong aura? She had felt him before then, well that was entirely possible, he supposed, considering how little attention he had spent on her at the time. How puzzling...she'd never said a word before. He had spent long hours under her psychic watch, and not once had she ever indicated noticing anything out of the ordinary. _

_Intrigued, he drifted closer, still concealed by a thin weave of magic to keep the cloaking in place, invisible eyes examining the delicate arrangement of her face, familiar to him from the past, but made more so from another source completely. The dainty, breakable softness to her cheeks and slim nose was very European, the high brow and petite framework from jaw to toes the typical structure befitting a woman of her particular heritage. Her hair was lush and long, deep, deep brown so dark it could have looked black under the right lighting, but he knew it wasn't. Just as he knew there was a shy sweetness to the mouth that pursed so stubborn and strong. _

_Hair and cheeks and lips he knew were imprinted – copied exactly – upon another woman's face._

_That dignified head lowered, shoulders hunched slightly inwards as she turned away from the cramped, corner-tucked bed to face the rest of the floor. It was a two-room apartment, small, cheap, and knew the touch of poverty forged from choice rather than circumstance; a deliberate descent from the quarters of a woman who had once seemed to care about appearances and finance. Her hands were clasped together, just beneath her breasts, held tight to her ribs as though to keep her torso in the proper shape. The white of her knuckles was also the only sign she gave of being anything less than utter pinnacle of control._

_"I don't know who or—" a pause with which to swallow a tiny gasp, "or what you are, but I want to ask if..." It took her a moment to regain that frigid composure, working to fight emotion to grasp that mask of coldness and weld it back into place. It wasn't something he would have expected to come from her mouth, not when he looked back to analyze the previous encounters he'd had with her – frozen and uncaring, like an android that had only ever pretended to be human. Yet the words came, unhindered by anything but her own self-defensive resolve. "You were always by the crib. Always. At first I thought you were something I imagined, doing what I couldn't because I was scared of Joseph getting mad and... But you kept coming back, and I'd come home and she'd still be fine..."_

_She stopped, and he could feel the wary spark of the grudge coiled inside the innermost regions of his chest ease and melt away. This was the mother he had been almost certain had withered and wasted away inside her; still alive, still frightened, and still worried for the sake of the baby she had pretended not to want out of terror of her tyrant of a husband. In the place of righteous, justified condemnation, he knew only pity and tolerance; no longer content to simply despise the pitiful human for her faults._

_"Please," she said, so softly that a human man would never have heard it. "Please, if there's anything in you that feels compassion, keep her safe?" Her voice broke, a stillness devoted to the willful battle against the tears he could see welling in her eyes. Shattered tears; tired and sorry, so, so sorry. "Don't let her make the same mistake I did."_

_He shed the cloaking magic like a garment, letting it slide back from his head and shoulders to slip away like a web of gossamer leaving him in plain, visible view. The patter of small transparent feet shuffling hastily backwards accented a sharp intake of breath, the woman's figure half-sinking into a cowered hunch before he reached out with one hand to cup her chin in a gentle palm. Looking up into his eyes, fixed like a timid animal, she calmed despite instinctual suspicion of the stranger – ears open to receive the words he gave her in return, before conceding to follow him into the soothing dark of eternity that would hush her fear and cushion, at last, all that terrible, acrid pain. _

_"You have my word."_

* * *

Leaving his lungs in a long, weary sigh, his breath floated with the arcane syllables of a quiet spell as he pushed the hair back from his face, the fine gold tresses instantly drying, smoothing and untangling themselves as they fell back into place about his shoulders. His clothing dried as well, flattening out from where it had stuck to the planes of his chest, back and thighs – droplets of the liquid lubricant dispersing into nothing upon automatic, unthinking command. "Probably not what you had in mind when asking me to protect her, was it, Claire?" He exhaled again, the flash of remembrance having caught him unawares, and steadied himself by leaning tense shoulders against the door behind him.

White teeth gritted within a clenched jaw, losing grip over a frustrated groan that slipped from his throat. He swore most vividly, the oath leaving his mouth as though dragged from him via the sweetest, most decadent form of torture, elegant hands adopting the tight clench of fists, head smacking forcibly backward against the solid, sturdy wood of the door. What in the name of everything sacred had come over him? He had almost broken down and kissed her, no matter how decisively he'd chosen to keep a healthy distance in regard to her present, delicate condition _–_ had just managed to pull away before giving in and ravishing those damnably enticing lips of hers.

She ruled him so easily. Everything about her proved a bewitchment to his senses; bright, wide eyes that peered up at him with such imploring innocence, smooth skin embracing soft flesh, a scent as overpowering and rich as a field of wildflowers, searing warmth…leading to arousal of the soul in addition to the body. Without even a single thought of effort, she tempted him, could have tempted the most devout and pious priest to swallow his own vows of celibacy with the gusto of a meager, supplemental pill. A magnificently compelling combination of original mortality wrapped in a shell of immortal brilliance and immersed in the soft loveliness of womanhood. Oh, how he wanted her…desperately, deeply.

With a stern shake of his head, he loosened up every single muscle in his body, calling upon those old, war-gouged shields to lodge between his rational mind and the inner heart that so badly wanted to indulge. It would do him no good to make her unnecessarily uncomfortable; it wasn't her fault he'd subconsciously panicked and yanked her back too fast, therefore terribly unfair to even consider doing anything remotely out of line. At least, not in her current state. And yet how terribly, ironically cruel...to hit such a snag just when he'd managed to soothe away all those bothersome lines and barriers.

A hot bath – that was what he needed. But first, he would pay a visit to the expert in strange medical matters; knowing that if he at least talked about it with someone available, someone who understood, then he would feel at least _somewhat_ better.

He touched the tips of his first two fingers to his lips, briefly pressing them to the door of Lilith's bedchamber before striding across the library. His step paused just beside the desk, wondering vaguely whether he should leave her a note in case she woke to find him gone. But after the ordeal she had just been through, she was bound to be liberally and totally exhausted, and not likely to wake any time soon. Decided, he slid silently through the entry door and into the black stone hallway outside the safe warmth of his own rooms. The touch of one palm flat to the smooth surface of the closed door invoked a small sparking symbol of violet fire followed in quick succession by the dull clicking of the locks moving back into air and magic-tight place. Because holiness be damned if he would leave Lilith alone inside an unlocked chamber in this place. The entire realm was a deathtrap for her; an already fragile girl with a muddled memory.

Turning sharply, he strolled along the chilly hallway, casual, unhurried, ghostlike with a pale, shimmering angel's luminance – flashing gold every time he passed under a torch _–_ and ignoring the doors to either side until the hall branched off into five separate halls. Taking the way farthest to his right, he followed a short, dark pathway until it opened up into a wide, softly lit room lined with lush, suede-padded chairs. The single, presently closed door at the opposite end was plain, but over the knob hung a small plaque engraved simply with;_ I will take sickness from the spirit of you,__ for I am the hand that heals. _

He hesitated just outside the door for a moment and listened, ears sharp, smiling as he caught the woman's voice, softly accented, but quite firm, coming through the wood. "Hold _still,_ you snarky serpent, and it won't hurt so much!" she was snapping, decidedly annoyed, "for the love of everything holy..." Raising a hand, he rapped gently with his knuckles and was received by the same voice calling tersely, "well, get in, then!" Doing as he was told, he pushed the door open and stepped inside with a thin smile to indicate his amusement.

The room he entered was a medical office; but it was very unlike the kind of medical rooms a modern human would consider top of the line. This was because modern human doctors no longer worked in ways derived from nature and magic. Several tables littered by bins and shelves crammed fit to burst with materials had been shoved up against the wall to the immediate right. The storage containers held metal instruments, thick rolls of gauze and tape, stones of various colors and textures, pestles and mortars, bowls, spoons, sticks of chalk, string, and bags upon bags stuffed full of thousands of different kinds of herbs and plants that gave the room a pungent, embittered smell. In the center of an open space of floor, bathed in the bright, non-flickering light of a clear glass globe hanging overhead stood a firmly padded examination table, its sturdy metal frame a dull silvery gray color in the shine.

Lounged, if uncomfortably so, upon this table was a man. Or, at least he had the head and torso of a man, dark-skinned and svelte. The lower half of his form tapered into the lithe, serpentine body of a rusty brown adder, the scales that patterned the flesh tinted with a deep hue of russet, reddish auburn down to the twitchy tip of an annoyed tail. His thin face was sharp and pointed, formed in a manner that was faintly snakelike with narrowed predator's eyes and a small, blunt nose with nostrils that were formed almost like slits. Those crystal sky eyes, made of a blue that couldn't quite decide whether or not it wanted to seem transparent, flickered upward as Azrael entered, his lip curling with a grimace as a small, red-headed woman put the finishing touches on the thick circle of bandaging around his hips – where snake scales merged with flesh. The angel nodded civilly, murmuring in acknowledgement, "Asmodeus."

"Azrael," was the answer, spoken a forced kind of a accent to the tone, just before his attention was rent by pain. The serpent demon half twisted away from the woman's hands as she pressed down on the wrapped gauze, his pale blue eyes flashing, slit pupils dilating rapidly. "Watch it!" He hissed viciously at her, thin, forked tongue lashing the air with sore temper.

She glared at him and, reaching with a quick hand, cuffed him across the back of the head. "Shut your mouth, ungrateful brat. If you hadn't provoked Raphael, _this,_" she indicated the bandage, her expression and manner tight with aggravation, "never would have needed to be done! Now scat. I'm done with you for now."

Asmodeus' lips pulled back, a long, evil hiss issuing from his throat, in the same moment he extended the slender end of his serpent's tail to wrap around her wrist, a living manacle of pure muscle and scales. "How much longer must I surrender myself to your tortures, heavens-bitch?"

"'Long as it takes for you to heal, incubus trickster," she snarled in reply, gripping the thick, sinew of his tail with long, suddenly dagger-sharp nails. He let out another short, pained hiss and released her as she added, "now, _get_ _out_ of my office." With a click of her heel she turned smartly away, walking daintily over to the nearest table to put away the rolls of gauze and muslin drawstring bag of what smelled suspiciously of vervain. _Heaven's plant._ The holy leaves of the vervain were one of the most powerful healing aids in existence. Old World healers had once sworn oaths upon its name in thanks and gratitude for its strength and its power, claiming that its monumental properties were drawn directly from the heart of God.

Well, that could have been true enough, considering the heart of God was in everything God created...

As he slid gingerly to the tiled floor, Asmodeus's thick tail seemed to coil into itself and separate into a pair of long, sinuous legs with small, faery-like feet colored the same milky espresso brown as the rest of him. He winced, touching a hand to his bare belly, around which the bandage remained tightly wrapped despite the physical transformation. "Fuck," he snapped, a short hiss of grievance, and glared at the healer's back before lifting his nose with a contemptuously distasteful air and stalking out the door, letting it slam shut behind him.

Azrael watched him leave; violet eyes blank and uncaring, but with just the barest hint of a smirk at his lips to indicate that he was fighting back a peal of laughter. "So…" he began casually when it had calmed, attention turning to the woman.

She was stripping off the clean white coat she had worn while tending to her patient and draping it over the back of a stiff, wooden chair and grousing. "Bloody bastard," she ranted irritably, pulling her feet out of a pair of thin, leather slippers and nudging those aside before she sat down, "bitchier than any of the other demons I get in here complaining they've gotten on the wrong side of a guardian—" she rolled her eyes, the irises a pearly silver in color, and then they cleared, truly seeing her visitor for the first time. The previously sour mood evaporated, instantly exchanged for a bright, half-crooked smile. "Well, well," she crowed, "look who it is! Come sit!" Holding out a hand jerking it with a short pulling motion, the floor a few feet in front of her buckled and rippled, then pulled upward, twisting itself into a backless chair that appeared as if it had originally been carved from the same material as the floor had been, seamless and melted as one into the surface.

Obeying with a smile, Azrael perched on the chair she had made for him, crossing his legs comfortably at the knees. "Thank you, Pandora," he murmured.

Pandora grinned at him. "Haven't seen you around much apart from work lately. Still off courting? Or better yet," she leaned forward slightly, elbows on her knees, eyes flashing with conspiratorial, enigmatic intrigue, "gotten past the courting part?" For a moment there was a hush broken only by the angel's alabaster complexion flushing a pale, rosy pink, and the medic delighted in a shriek of victorious glee. "_Ooh,_ Azrael! You sly fox, you," she teased, voice high-pitched and girlish, drawing up her knees, wrapping her arms around them and staring at him with genial eagerness for gossip.

He cleared his throat, the blush receding back to flawless, star-dusted pallor – crossing his arms over his chest while meeting her stare. Quirking an inquisitive eyebrow, he questioned vaguely, "what?"

Throwing up her hands, she cried, "Saints above... You _know_ what!"

He laughed. Leave it to Pandora to lighten his stress about tenfold within the span of four seconds; she was so relaxed about the things that embarrassed him, finding ways to get him to talk out his troubles without making him fidget as though he were being scrutinized or interrogated. That and she often understood him better than anyone else in hell, for various reasons, not quite as well as Balael did, but Pandora had skill with empathy. She was very like Raphael in that respect, able to reach behind the words and expression to get a good grip of what was going on, it was part of a medic's talent for diagnosis, and it was often wonderful.

Tipping his chin with playful, mock-irritation, he clarified smoothly, "you think I want to blather about my love life to you? You get plenty of that already."

"Oh, that doesn't count," she teased, lazily flapping her hand about in a circular motion as though she was ordering a sandwich. "Besides, you need a therapist more than Jeqon does."

"...Jeqon?"

Her smile was soft, secretive, and clearly not going to tell him anything. Shaking her finger at him, she chastised lightly, "doctor-patient confidentiality, laddybuck. It's his business to share."

Knowing the soldier she spoke of as he did, it was in his best interests to leave it alone. Jeqon was not a social creature and did not enjoy being dragged into the pool of court intrigue, which was something Azrael definitely understood. "I have no desire to know," he stated bluntly, "I have no need for a kunai in my chest, thank you. I just was not expecting his name, of any you might have mentioned."

"Be that as it may," she poked the same finger at him with a stern look, "changing the subject doesn't get you free."

He didn't answer for a long while, but stared down at his own hands which lay in a casual resting position in his lap, gauging his own thoughts with utmost care. The shade in his eyes shifted from neutral lavender to a dark plum, and he leaned back, arms extending to brace himself against the surface of the will-constructed chair. Pandora waited patiently, watching him with a lenient fondness to guide her gaze as she took in the obvious clearing of the shadow that had been eating up the seraph's aura. "I remember," he spoke quietly, and part of him was far away despite every word, "when I was with Rebecca, how empty I always felt whenever I left her and her selfishness. As soon as I was out of range, I would question myself, why I needed something that always made my heart feel as though it had been compressed between a hammer and anvil. I always went back, even though I knew she was no good for me. But Lilith..."

With a breath, Azrael's shoulders lost some of the tension leftover from older days, his expression softening and the light in his eyes gentling with a warm flush of blue. "One minute she is as shy and meek as a mouse, the next she's as brilliant as a star with enough energy and spark to—but as withdrawn as a flower just before it blooms. She is complex and engaging. I feel _whole_ with her…_complete._ As if all these years I had been missing a piece of my soul and I had never known until I found her." A lopsided smile twitched at the corner of his lips as he asked, "silly, no?" his gaze flickering to the company's face, almost sheepish with the splurge of deeper thought.

Pandora returned a smile of her own, reaching out to thump a closed fist against Azrael's knee. "Not a bit. I'm glad you've found her." Her silvery eyes twinkled with a mixture of pride and pleased joy, flashing with mischief. "I don't think I've ever seen you so happy." He sobered, demeanor going still and tense, and it surprised her, made her wonder if she had misread the signals and had missed something obvious. A single scarlet eyebrow quirking, she ventured to ask, "what s it?"

There was an ominous edge to way he looked at her, something that she had not quite grasped, but sent a shivering warning through her senses nonetheless. Silent, eyes dark with a message that she was meant to understand without his speaking – that he could not voice – he looked up at her. Willing, compelling; _please, understand me… _

She read his expression as if it were a novel detailing exactly what had happened; a bathtub, water, breathlessness, words of a language her tongue had been banned from uttering long ago. A rush of heat, air, water, and then… Pandora's jaw dropped, her eyes widening in absolute shock. He couldn't have. He _wouldn't_ have done _that_. She gaped at him for a moment, trying to double-check her own intuition before she spluttered hoarsely, "no way...there's no _way _you—"

"I did."

"_Azrael_…" she breathed, gaping, staring at him as though she couldn't recognize what she was looking at, as though knowledge and illusion had just collided and intermingled to completely switch around in a confounding mix of insanity. She said it not out of horror or chastisement, but out of an alarm driven from the jolt of utter bewilderment. "This isn't like you at _all_—"

"Let me finish? Please, Pandora, this is hard enough to deal with as it is." He sighed wearily, shoulders slumping as he slouched forward, pale hair falling over his shoulders once again. Sorrow…and perhaps a small portion of regret? "I remembered that when she eventually died we would be parted. She wanted to know if there was another way and I told her, but I never intended to actually bring her…then she—" A small smile crept across the fretting face as he recalled what Lilith had done in response to his attempt to brush off the idea. "She pinned me to the couch and ordered me to do it, and any effort I made to change her mind she completely trashed." Warm violet eyes focused back onto Pandora, a hapless kind of shrug shifting one shoulder. "I wasn't given much of a choice. I did it to make her happy, and thank the heavens she got through it alive."

For a long time Pandora simply stared at him, the most peculiar expression on her face, and he began to wonder if the fiery little female was about to blow up on him. Her temper was sure to be close to the fuse already, what with having to deal with Asmodeus, and she wasn't exactly known for being the most soft-spoken when she was in an edgy mood. But to his pleasant surprise, she shook her head, musing quietly, "by the Almighty, Azrael, she loves you. She _really_ loves you." She smiled, her expression filled to the brim with affectionate pride. "If she was willing to give up everything she had in that world for you, to be with you…damn, you are one lucky angel of death." She instantly broke her own serious mood by ruffling his hair as she stood from her seat and turned toward the desk.

With a mockingly horrified and insulted noise, he gingerly patted his hair back into place; but he stopped short of making some snooty remark, gaze turned wary, when he looked up. The entire length of body had just gone tense, as if something sharp or burning hot had just touched her and she was physically reacting to the surprise. Her bright hair whipped about her head as she whirled around to face him again, her expression bloodless and strangely agonized. "What—" he began, alarmed, but she didn't give him time to finish.

"Lucifer," she hissed, her lips pursing in harried fear-tinged disgust as she all but spat the name. "I didn't think much of it at first, but after you left the judges' hall last night he came perusing the new souls. And he was thorough, too, more than usual. I think he's looking for a replacement for Ophelia..."

The heart in Azrael's chest seemed to freeze mid-beat, every nerve tingling with an overpowering, instinctual sense of warning. God above, if the demon king was searching for a queen, he was going to be much more watchful of the realm's incoming traffic; it had been how his last wife had been chosen, keeping a close eye on the barriers and soul-imprinting. This was not a good thing. Lilith was not a dead soul damned for sin, but she was no stronger than one, and had no authority or power beyond what his own titles and claims of ownership could offer her. The king of hell was infamous for his cruelty, his malice, and his great dislike for being thwarted – and if the news of an unregistered hybrid brought in without his permission ever reached him in the blunt eye of reality, she was at great risk.

"...a mortal woman in his realm would be awfully vulnerable to him—"

"Excuse me," he stood, instinctual concern causing the movement to blur with a primitive access of immortalized speed, and suddenly at the door with a sharp movement that would have been impossible for human eyes to follow. "My gratitude for the warning." Yet just before he reached the threshold, her voice called his attentions again.

"Watch her carefully. Her memory could resurface at any time. Anything that even subconsciously reminds her of her real self could break the locks, which can trigger pretty serious shock symptoms. Make sure you call me when she remembers. And Azrael," she took a steadying breath before saying, "do _whatever_ you can to prevent him from finding her."

He turned back toward her for a brief moment, eyes a pale, luminescent amethyst, a stoically calm mask over his angular features. He didn't need to ask her how she had known about the lack of memory. She was a healer, they knew things about the psyche and the soul that were beyond his grasp. "And if he does despite me?" The very thought was terrifying, but he needed to know her thoughts.

"God knows, love," she whispered, fingering the small cross that hung around her neck, iron and bright. "Only God knows."

With a creak of old hinges and a soft whispering of dark cloth, he was gone. Off to fulfil his self-imposed duties to protect the only woman he would ever truly love.

A hand closed around the cross of silver, pearly eyes seeing into an aura of blazing white and edged in deep violet fire. The shadows – the ones that had crept across his soul like a spidery stain, eating at his purity and life – were gone. All was clean and clear again, as if he had never fallen to the blackness so long ago. "_Luck be a lady_," she whispered in prayer, "may it prove true."

* * *

Azrael pushed the light-weight door open with the ball of one foot, feeling the hot dampness from his bath disperse with the cooler, more comfortable air of the bedchamber just outside. Water droplets and moist vapor chilled rapidly, forming an iridescent film of liquid spread across his skin, hair hanging in wet tendrils down to tickle his shoulders. A weary sigh lilted, arced, transformed into a frustrated groan as he braced one wrist against the frame of the open bathroom door, pressing his face into the flesh and muscle of his own arm. Although he had expected the shower to calm his already scattered thoughts, he wasn't terribly surprised to note that he was still shaken by Pandora's words.

Lucifer; king of the realm that was home to the outcasts of heaven and earth, a king of all gain and no give. The Morningstar had lost all his angelic compassion, moral, and feeling when Michael the warrior had ostracized him from the Almighty's world, casting him into the Darkness along with his followers. Out of nothing but spite and rage, Lucifer had constructed his kingdom of fire and ice and cold, unfeeling stone – assigning his original followers to the positions they now held permanently as ordained by his rule.

Not having spent much time in the older denizen's presence, Lucifer was never interested enough in his Ambassador to seek an audience with him, nor did Azrael care to approach the demon that had once been his eldest brother. But Pandora's words had infused a lingering chill of dread beneath his skin and within his bones. For all his decadence and distance, the fallen Morningstar was truly dangerous.

Mortals held a certain, spell-like charm and allure to those of the immortal realms that was almost like a drug. Azrael had experienced its effects firsthand, and knew what exposure to the warmth and fragile delicacy of mortality did to an immortal soul...and not just mortality, but love. Love could be oxygen, or it could be arsenic, and something in the angel's heart told him that Lucifer had once loved very deeply and very greedily, and that he had lost that love. A loss which formed an emptiness that he had been trying to refill.

Ophelia...he remembered her quite clearly still, though it had been thousands of years ago; a soft-spoken and uncommonly kind woman, pale and pretty and damned. The poor woman had been sold into an unhappy marriage as a mortal, committed adultery, and was killed as a result of her husband's rage. Minos had agreed with the angel of death to put the girl into purgatory as was customary for a penitent sufferer, but Lucifer had found her before they could make the assignment permanent.

He had used her like a rag doll, playing with her for a while before tossing her aside again, and nine months later, Ophelia had borne her master a son. Yet Lucifer had barely acknowledged Beelzebub's existence, ignoring his responsibilities as a father – ignoring the miracle that was immortal conception. Mother and child suffered neglect for nearly five years until Ophelia had finally put her foot down, refusing to obey the king she was bound to any longer. The devil had laughed, binding her with torn strips of the bed sheets on which they had conceived their child and cast her out into an earthly sea to dwell forever in misery. Banished for eternity, Ophelia had never been seen again.

Poor, gentle Ophelia. It had been then that Azrael had come to understand the true corrupted malice that had taken over the traitorous angel who had once been a brother to him. The Morningstar was no more. Now, instead of curiosity and partial pity, Azrael held only disgust and contempt for the demon king.

By nature's decree he was the ruler of hell – of punishment, pain, and anguish. Yet there was much more to hell than simply the punishment levels for broken souls, and Lucifer had been ignoring the needs of his people for millennia. Instead, he chose to immerse himself in a personal wellspring of pleasure. His brides, courtesans more-like, he took whenever he chose, whether willing or un. If a woman struck his fancy she was done for, doomed in the most basic sense of the term, mentally, spiritually, physically, and emotionally; and the children gained from several of these unions, he had no care nor feeling for.

Spurred on by this action, the hatred that Beelzebub contained for his father had exploded in retaliation to the cruelty done to his mother, and the young demon had abandoned the royal quarters to live as an outcast to his own royal blood. His fury at his true father intertwined with his grief for his mother, from whom he had received his silver hair and the silvery-white coloring of the dragon form he had been blessed with at his birth, but the combination created a kind of poison that had almost caused the prince to render himself ill will hatred and worry and pitying despair all melded into one.

Beelzebub was only the first of Lucifer's miserable, ill begotten offspring, but he was also the worst wounded by his father's downturned disposition; hurt by his father's inability to care for him and guilt for his mother's fate. It had been Mastema to take the young demon in as his own son, raising him to have honor and self-respect, yet Beelzebub grieved. Still he was torn between who he had once been and who he was trying to become. He had been lost, floundering deep in stagnant water. That was until the day he chanced upon the visiting angel of death. Young at that time, Azrael had stopped by Mastema's apartments to implore the wiser figure for advice on a dilemma between himself and Minos, the judge of the damned, and after offering council Mastema introduced the angel child to the younger demon boy.

Inspired by his new friendship, Beelzebub began to fight his own grief. Slowly but surely he worked his way up to lord over his siblings, becoming the highest-ranking prince over all of hell, the _Crown_ Prince and not only by birth. As he grew, Beelzebub slowly began to take over the governing tasks that should have been his father's. With help and counsel from his people and the Council, he was able to bring the realm to the stable, organized and even flourishing state it was now. Lucifer remained both aloof and in charge, relaxed and uncaring; without thought and without a care that his son was, by all rights and honesty, the _true_ ruler.

And yet...

Azrael's muscles tightened, his fists and jaw tense in stubborn self-assurance and tenacity. Even in the state she was now, Lilith was still human by birth. She still held the allure, the deliciously hot flow of blood and life pulsing beneath her skin, the delicacy that caused an immortal to pause. She still had that delectable scent to her, wickedly taunting any who happened to catch a taste of it in the air. She was still an attraction; the immortality he had granted her only intensified the beauty she held.

But ruler be damned, if Lucifer laid one hand on her, Azrael would have a few things to say to His Infernal Majesty – and none of them would be "God bless." But for now, she was safe with him. No one could enter or exit his chambers without his knowledge, and if they did, he would know if Lilith was in danger. He had spread his protection over every inch of her bare flesh; a literal calling card, a warning to any other immortal she happened upon, his own personal mark. Even the Morningstar would have a bit of difficulty in defying the ownership he had expressed over Lilith. By the laws instated and agreed upon by both immortal realms, she literally belonged to him – was his property, even if _he_ didn't think of it in that manner. The devil would not be able to touch her without provoking the wrath of the whole of heaven and over half of his own realm. As a seraph, he had powerful enemies, it was true. But he also had powerful allies.

Coaxing himself into relaxing, Azrael rolled his shoulders, every single muscle in his body loosening at his mental command to calm. He shook back his hair, wet bangs flying out and falling against his cheekbones, and pressed his palms against his own chest as he stepped back toward the open doorway that led to his bedroom. He let his hands trace down his own sides to rest at his hips, the liquid coating his skin sloughing into nothingness, leaving him dry but for his hair. The clothing came as he bid it, a stretch of habitual magic that summoned a soft, airy garment from the contents in his wardrobe. All silk and silver embroidery depicting the traceries of feathers into the edges at sleeves and the hem that draped the floor behind him as he walked from one room to another.

It showpieced its contents; a waist-high display post upon which there lay a single book. And for as many as he owned, there was no other that he both loved and despised as much as this one.

The pages turned, shimmering with a faint, powdery iridescence, his eyes quickly scanning each for a something that seemed to be eluding him. Scrawled black lines of writing striped the paper, ironically and unintentionally reflecting his moods at the time each had been written. Thick and hard with anger, small and plain with despair, and then very slowly descending into a firmer, more elegant and controlled penmanship that told of easier days. The days that had cued his discovery of a ward. He stopped, having found what he had been searching his records for, and let the page fall open.

_**Lilith Isobel Everett (a.a. Gandion) – Born: September 8, 1990**_

The scratching of a quill had become quite a comforting sound over the years. The slightly bitter smell of ink, the dry, rough texture of parchment, and the smooth surface of paper imprinted into his photographic memory as symbols of solace and tranquility. Soft scents, textures, and sounds which reminded him of many things – some which he was fond of recalling as well as those that he would have liked to forget. The moments when he sat down to journal had always been a time where he could be alone to think or to sift through long memory. He did not write his memories down as many mortals did – for he would never run the risk of losing them, as he never aged. Nor did he write for pleasure. Writing was part of his job, to catalogue the births and deaths of his mortal charges.

Every human who had ever lived had a place in his book, their names partnered with the dates of birth and of death, along with the manner in which their end had come about. The book was thick, made to be unending, filled with pages of a material so fine of weave that it could have been constructed of the same material as a butterfly's wings, covers crafted of paper-thin sheets of glass tinted with the blue of a summer sky and embossed with silver traceries of the numeral for thirteen. His number. The Book of the Dead – a tome of history that stretched on forever, given to him by his only parent to keep his records in. Though to that very day, he didn't know exactly what the book's purpose was.

He ran the tips of slender fingers over the slightly raised, printed line of words; his own scrolling handwriting shimmering up at him from its place on the page. Just a few days ago this would have been enough for her entry, but things had changed, and change was one of the only things he could count on. Dipping the end of the nearby quill into a small bottle of ink, he touched the tip back to the paper to add another line beneath the first.

_**Given immortality: December 3, 2011**_

He looked up then, the lock spells at his door alerting him to the presence of someone just outside the entrance, coming close with a clear intended destination in mind. Gently nudging the book closed, he adjusted the volume to its rightful, centered place on the pedestal before turning to the door. The room was rather bare, housing naught but book and writing materials, the very barest of the rooms he had and actually used (one he didn't think he had even opened in the past five hundred years). With a casual flick of his wrist, he locked the door behind him as he stepped into the hallway that was the annex into all his other rooms and pushed into the library, warm in its soft light and rich color, to approach the main door just as the visitor outside it gave a short knock. Tracing one finger down the edge of the handle, he listened to the gentle clicking of the locks within the wood respond to his magic, and then pulled the barrier open.

The visitor was a message runner – one of the many servants in the service of the nobility of hell, and one that he did not know by name. This one walked on the hind legs of what looked to be a Burmese tiger, and held out a plain white envelope with a hand that ended in well-trimmed, irretractable cat claws. "Please excuse the interruption, Your Grace,"the boy said with a bow.

_That_ he was used to. He was considered upper class in hell's hierarchy, somewhere just slightly below the royalty of the court. Also, he was (in a manner of speaking) an ambassador for heaven, and was treated with immense amount of respect by a great percentage of the lower-ranked demons such as this one. "No interruption at all," Azrael remarked kindly, taking the envelope with a gentle, somewhat tired smile. It had been almost ten hours, and only now was he beginning to feel the toll draining so much energy. "What can I do for you?"

The boy bowed again, bending just slightly at the waist, and then straightened to give his message. "His Infernal Majesty wishes to express his most humble invitations to an autumn ball to be thrown in celebration of the anniversary of his coronation as the king of our realm," a gesture of silvery claws, "date, time, and details within the invitation itself." His posture relaxed (a sign that he was finished with his message) but his big brown eyes flickered to the right and left before he added in a whisper, "begging your pardon, Your Grace, but…" he made a harried motion as if to say, _may we go inside?_

Azrael stood aside, pulling the door open wider to let the messenger through, and the boy stepped over the threshold before bowing yet again, expression rather nervous. "Apologies, Sir, but I was told by His Highness the Crown Prince to inform you that the ball is being used as a cover for an investigation being made into the private residence sector. Apparently the King is looking for someone that's been smuggled in."

Pale gold eyebrows lifted in sardonic surprise. So his act of bringing Lilith into the realm had been discovered much sooner than he'd intended. "Who has been set to the case?"

"My Lady Nergal, or so I was told, Sir…and I've heard that she's set her Ghosts for the search. They're going to be investigating everyone's private quarters—"

"—and arresting anyone that has not attended the formalities," Azrael finished for the boy, feeling his heart squeeze with discomfort. "Well that is definitely not good…" he looked back at the messenger, smile having faded to a frown of concern. "Thank you for the information. You may go." With a final bow and a smile in return for the kindness he had been shown, the boy left, pulling the door closed behind him.

Azrael, however, was not happy. Scratch that, he was on a clear path to becoming purely livid. Trust Lucifer to catch wind of the deed so quickly…obviously he knew that such a one was of interest to him, because he certainly didn't care about the threat that could possibly be imposed by an intruder. The situation would have been amusing if not for the terrible danger it put Lilith in.

He traced the invisible locking symbol back into the wood of his front door before sinking wearily into the armchair at his desk, tearing open the envelope given him. The card that fell out was of fancy gold leaf paper, penned in elegant scarlet ink that shone uncomfortably like blood. It described the ball as a formal, a celebration, and pressed upon required attendance – promising refreshment, music, and dancing to compensate in honor of their king. Azrael snorted, but managed to resist the incredible urge to rip the paper (in addition to the padded arm of his chair) to shreds. It was insulting to see the word _honor_ thrown out in such a casual way. The king of hell had no honor anymore, and to ask that it be bestowed upon his name was a not-so-subtle slap across the face for one of the Seraphim.

With a sigh, he tossed the invitation to the desktop and rested his chin in one elegant hand. Well, if this didn't make a nasty little tangle…it was a good thing indeed that he was well-liked among the people of hell (and that Beelzebub considered him such a close friend) else he would not have heard of the underside to Lucifer's plot. Lilith would have been doomed for sure. But what to do? He couldn't leave her here while he obeyed orders and attended the event, for the police were under orders to search the private rooms and they would most certainly find her. Nergal was damn good at her job as the chief of hell's police force, and her Ghosts were nothing to sneeze at either. Expertly honed and trained, the five elite guards were nearly as strong as the Horrors were.

The best possible solution was to take her back home, to the mortal realm, yet she was still weakened and terrible vulnerable without her memory, to the point that it bordered on dangerous. It would be impossible to leave her there alone. He could conceal her with magic, but the charms that would take were strong ones, requiring lots of power and very easy to both notice and track. If he cast it, he would be questioned about what he was hiding, and that would not be a smart move. But then what else could he do…bring her along?

_Actually..._

After a moment of thought, he supposed that it would have to do. As long as he kept her close she would be fine. Besides, he _was_ high in rank, and sometimes the nobles of hell kept one or two of the imported souls as servants…or as entertainment. So if he could pull off the act that he was keeping Lilith for purely physical reasons, they should be able to get through without drawing any unwanted suspicion. And anyway, it was unlikely that Lucifer would be at the event himself, he had better things to do than mingle with the rabble of his court. Things like seeking an illegal hybrid that looked no different from any other soul.

Azrael hummed wryly against a palm as he rubbed his temple, running the makeshift plan through his mind one more time to sift out any problems. How ironic that the best way to hide was right under their very noses.

"Are you all right?" He turned his pale head, only mildly surprised to see Lilith approaching him from her room, a slight frown of worry clouding her face. "Do you have a headache?" this came more softly now that she had his attention, as if she were afraid that speaking too loudly might hurt him.

He smiled, touched by her concern. Maybe she was starting to remember, or at least gather enough of an emotional memory to feel sympathy for what she saw as pain. "I do not get headaches. But if I did, I would have one hell of a migraine right about now," he sighed, smile fading, and beckoned her over toward the desk. "We have a bit of a problem." She followed his silent request and came closer, but her expression was shadowed with hesitation. Daintily as a fawn, she sat on the chair's other arm, simple cotton pants starkly pale against the dark sage green of the upholstery upon which she perched as he elaborated.

"I have been ordered to attend a formal gathering tomorrow night. His Majesty's excuse is that we are celebrating the anniversary of his becoming king, and he has commanded that everyone is required to be there. But reliable sources have informed me that the real reason is to locate someone here who should not be." He paused, watching her face for sign of understanding or alarm as he let his hand fall back into his lap. None came without his final confirmation, but he could see just the barest hint of suspicion behind her blank face. "That person is you."

Immediately Lilith's eyes flew to his face. She said nothing, but he could read the fear behind her pretty green irises, and sure enough, she was biting her bottom lip, a sign of nerves that had for years made him wince with regret for the abuse to her pretty skin. "Stop that," he chided absently, reaching up to gently chuck her under the chin with light fingers, and her teeth released the flesh they held captive, eyes flickering with slight surprise. "The solution is a simple one—but I do not think you will like it."

"What is it?" she asked quietly, gaze falling to focus on the hands folded in her lap.

"I take you with me."

He heard the sharp intake of breath and felt her muscles tense as she got ready to stand and move away, but his hand slid against her skin to grasp her wrist, keeping her in place. What he really wanted to do was pull her into his lap, cuddle her against his chest, to offer comfort…but at this point, he didn't think she would appreciate that. So he restrained the instinctual want for touch, settling for the restraint of hands alone.

"But—but I'm not…they'll _know_ I'm not—"

"Yes, they will," he admitted, shifting his grip to a gentler one when she showed no further intention of moving and letting his eyes drift closed. He knew she was thinking of the demons' knowledge of the fact that she was anything but one of them. "But the nobles of this world are known for sometimes taking one or two of the damned souls that live here and using them as servants, among other things. It would take a fair bit of good acting, but if we make it seem like that is the situation, we should have few problems. No one knows that you are not damned and I can trust Minos not to raise a fuss, so we should manage."

Despite her memory being mostly depleted, Lilith was still quick to catch his wording, and fell back upon an involuntary suspicion. He had known that she would probably see it, yet that did not quell the pride that engulfed his senses when she reacted just as she would have done before. "_Among other things._.. What does that mean? Somehow I get the feeling I'm not going to be tailing around behind you holding your coat and a drink tray—" She slapped her free hand over her mouth, eyes gone wide as saucers as she turned to stare, absolutely horrified, at him. "I'm sorry, I—I didn't mean it like that—"

But Azrael merely laughed, reaching over to pat her knee in a mildly reassuring manner. "Yes, you most certainly did," he retorted, highly amused. "And I would not have it any other way. You do not need to watch your words around me—I am not your jailor or your master. I am simply your guardian…" violet eyes glittered with mischief as he let the lids slide back open to meet that grassy stare, "…among other things." It roused a delicate scowl out of her, and he laughed again, light and bell-like and free, almost making her forget her annoyance out of sheer, sudden infatuation for the sound. "That's my girl. But to answer your very good question; this is hell. Servile work is not the only popular thing that the damned can offer here."

Her eyebrows shot up, shyness momentarily forgotten in indignant offense. "You mean I'm supposed to act like I'm your—"

"Please, don't finish that," he implored with a wince, "I do not _ever_ want the word _whore_ anywhere near your mouth. But, sadly, you are correct. It would paint a better illusion to act as such." Her expression flashed from outrage to flustered embarrassment to confusion, and she finally settled on hesitation, wrapping her arms around her own ribs; she was visibly uncomfortable now, and Azrael hated that he was the cause of it. He raked his fingers through his loose hair and slouched forward in the chair, feeling quite weary and drained. "I am not going to make you do anything that you do not want to," he told her softly, "the entire point of this ridiculous venture is to ensure your safety and comfort." He got to his feet, feeling the weight of her eyes follow him as he did so. "Think on it, and get some more rest. Things will look better in the morning."

As his eyes fixed to her face and he felt his insides swell with a mixture of curdling worry and pained affection. She was so lovely; her hair loose and shining against the white of her skin and clothes, her eyes bright with both confusion and frustrated indignation. He wanted to touch her so blasted badly – the impulsive urge to grab her by the waist, throw her over his desk and ravish her senseless was so terrible that it almost physically hurt him to suppress it. The third time in an increment of no more than twelve hours, he must have been more flesh-starved than he had initially realized.

While he forced his eyes to remain at her face and his arms at his sides, the need for contact was too great to withstand. A single, slender white hand rose, the dark sleeve of his robe slipping down to catch at the crook of his elbow, fingers savagely controlled as he allowed his knuckles to brush lightly across her soft cheek. That one gentle stroke was all he needed to ease the raw blaze of need. "Sleep well," he murmured, before he turned to retreat to his own room, finding it a little easier to breathe with space not crowded with the sweet, beguiling scent of lily.

Lilith watched him go, her eyes trained to the sleek folds of cloth that draped his figure like a black dream rippling with silver stars, swathing a body that made something inside her weak and short of breath. It was odd, she had this wild impulse to chase after him and demand that he not leave her alone again. Purely ridiculous. He was expecting her to act like a prissy, sniveling slut and go traipsing around in a room full of demons. She shuddered, _demons…how utterly horrible._ She was _not_ the prostitute type! How could he just ask her to—but he had said that he wouldn't force her to do anything. It was for her safety, as he'd stated. If she didn't do something, she was bound to be caught, and who knew what sort of terrible things would happen if she were caught.

Perhaps he was right…and it wasn't like he had given her any reason to doubt his intentions. He hadn't even looked at her in a way she didn't like; sometimes with laughter, sometimes with thoughtful interest, sometimes with a burning intensity that brought a tremor to her knees. Though it was stepping on a fine line, half of her wanted to run and hide in a corner when he looked at her that way whereas the other half wanted him to turn those eyes right back to her when he looked away. But he had never laid a hand on her in a negative way, and she couldn't deny the trust that surfaced up from the side of her that so wanted to hurl herself across his lap and plead for attention.

With a low breath of affirmation, she decided that she would do as he had asked. She would go to bed (since she was still feeling tired from whatever had caused her memory to blank) and then spend the hours before the fated _celebration_ to mentally prepare herself. Getting to her feet, she approached one of the bookshelves lining the walls of the library. Many of the spines were labeled in languages she didn't understand, but after a few rows she found one that looked interesting – describing the power that myths and superstitions had over people and the purposes they served. It was a rather thick book and quite heavy, but she lugged it off to her room all the same; flopping down on the bed, propping herself up with a few pillows and began to read.

_"Among the various different histories of the peoples of the earth, there have been stories created to serve the sole purpose of explaining the world around them."_

Hardly within another hour, she had fallen asleep with the book flipped open over her lap. Her head lolling and her hands lying still at her sides, the words lay abandoned. But this time, she experienced the faint flickers of a dream.

* * *

**Yup, I'm still alive. Urgh, I'm sorry I took so long on this one...my inspirations were elsewhere for a while (on "Caveat," actually, which I'm pretty proud of so far, I recommend checking it out if you have time), and then I had this weird second-guessing moment and almost cut out a good portion of this chapter and the entirity of the next chapter...but I didn't. :) so all is well. This little plot-arc would have been too short if I had...so I just shifted around some other chapters. The only bad news about that is that you'll have to wait until volume 2 for more smex. There's been a lot going on, so it's only been once so far, but there will be more later for you lemon-fiends like me, I promise.  
**

**;D**

**So, no returned memory yet, but I've given you a bit of an insight on some history...and why Beelzebub's such a nice guy, considering his heritage. Also, just a note, his Dragon alter-ego/second-form is from his daddy. I'll go into that more later. As for Ophelia, I don't know if we'll ever meet her or if she's good and gone, I still have to decide. And, let's see...I believe I gave away another couple little somethings about Azrael's character. I do this unveiling in quite a bit of segments it seems, funny how I don't notice until I edit something the fifth time around. Oh, and one about someone else, too...I wonder which of you understood the first little scene, there.  
**

**And for Miss SweetRomeo...don't leave me :( it'll get better right away! I promise!  
**

**Funnily enough, someone asked me what inspired me to write this story. For it to make sense, I have to tell a little story...it was about five years ago now and I was sitting in my bedroom staring blankly out my window when I happened (I don't know why or how) on the idea that I wanted to write a little segment about an angel who was in love with a human girl. It was quite random and I'd only meant to write the one little segment, and it happened to turn into the very first draft of the climactic assault-saving-smooching scenes in chapter 14 ("A Place for the Lonely"). And then I just couldn't drop it for some reason. Before that I'd just called an end to my horrific fanfiction career and hadn't been able to finish a story all the way through, and this is the first one so far that's gotten so detailed, so long, so thorough, and so likely to get completed. For some reason, it just melded my passion for religious mythology and romance and spurred a want to improve myself. And now it's turned into a crucial portion of my life. My Beta and I can go for hours about it, which causes me some embarrassment to say, but it's true. Anyways, now you know. I never meant for the thing to get so crazy big or convoluted... are we glad or are we wishing I'd just shut up about now?**

**In any case, no promises about when I'll have the next chapter up, but I'll get it there as soon as I can. **

**ALSO!! I have now set up a myspace page, for those of you who use it, in which I'm going to try to start posting info on what's going on with story progress and what the hell I'm doing with myself between updates. I've also posted some of the self-illustration I've done, mainly photomanipulation, but it's interesting if you want to get a look in on what I imagine when I write my characters, as well as some -gasp- clothing designs! Yes, I realize what a tard I am. What can I say, it's fun. And it's a potential way to commune more easily and quickly with any readers who'd like to chat :] the address is in my profile, or you can message me for it if you'd like. Give me a holler or an add, I'd love to talk!**

**Much love to you all, please take a moment to review for me, pleasepleaseplease!**

**See you next time! **


	38. Viva Carnivale

**Chapter 56: Viva Carnivale**

Recommended Listening: "Living in the Shell" by Yoko Kanno, "Ballroom Theme" [from Disney's Haunted Mansion], and "Vocea" from Cirque du Soleil

* * *

She woke slowly, comfortable and warm, wrapped up in the blankets with her face buried in a pillow. She didn't want to move, though she knew that she ought to drag herself up and start doing something to make herself at least partially presentable. Though still slightly muddled from the aftereffects of shock, her internal clock told her that she only had a few scant, precious hours of prep-time left, and that she'd better hurry it up if she wanted to at least look like she belonged.

"Urgh…" she groaned, shifting to sit up and rub the drowsiness from her eyes. Looking around rather bleary-eyed, she noted that she had fallen asleep in her clothes and felt quite awful because of it. Her hair was mussed and tangled, wild with snarls as though she'd been snagged by a windstorm, and her skin felt as if it had been coated with a sticky layer of invisible grime.

Tidying the blankets, sheets and pillows as she got out of bed, her feet carried her across the floor to approach the bathroom. Simple in design; the room was small, tiled floor and whitewashed walls, a laminate counter within which there was a sink, mirror, towel bar (on which hung a pair of lusciously fluffy blue towels), and a tub situated opposite the door. It was clean and fresh and inviting, scented lightly with the newly unpackaged pine soaps and shampoo lined up along the little wooden shelf above the towels. Unfamiliar as the place was, she felt no worse for answering the call to bathe, and, stripping off her nightgown, she stepped into the tub and turned on the steaming water.

Lingering long under the hot cascade of wet, she did her best remember – hoping that she could force something,_ anything_, back from or into the gaping blank that served her for a memory. She tried tracing the events of her life, thinking that she would be able to work out what she was missing…but to no avail. No matter how she coaxed and squinted and stained, all she could bring her traumatized brain cells to recall was a scene she didn't recognize; a party or gathering of some kind, a room filled with people all dressed up in colorful costumes.

Again and again the scene flashed before her eyes; exactly the same each time, as though her brain was on automatic reboot to the one snippet of time she couldn't even put a name or date to. But that wasn't right, the vision changed...slowly, faintly, only gradually from one increment to the next, and only in the slightest way. First there were only a few, dropping lightly like pearlescent leaves colored like winter. And as the scene continued to replay, the dancing and celebration, they grew more numerous, until they fell thick as a snowfall floating in an airy, billowing mass among the seemingly oblivious people. Such lovely white feathers...

Pain was what made her stop trying. Not in her head, her temples and brain felt perfectly fine, but there was a throbbing, nagging feeling somewhere around the left side of her chest, as if her heart was being slowly squeezed between a pair of very hard, flat surfaces. It hurt…but not in a direct way. Not in a _real_ way, as if she were merely imagining that she felt it, or it was in the process of fading away.

Frustrated new weight of weariness that was the only outcome of her attempts to shove her emptied brain into action, and feeling somewhat rushed for time, Lilith dried herself with a few furious swipes with one of the towels. Wringing the water from her hair, she combed it into limp submission to hang straight down her back, letting it air dry while she approached the daunting wardrobe. Eying the rows of silk and satin without any inspiration, she searched for something to assist her in playing the part of a servant. Nothing she saw seemed to be appropriate. One piece was too fancy, another too gaudy, yet another not near humble enough for a slave. It honestly seemed as though the wardrobe was trying to thwart her quest for adequate clothing to the point of hiding whatever of its contents might have been useful.

After much deliberation, she decided on a plain, cotton dress. Long-sleeved, with an empire waist and a high collar, it was a smooth gray in color with a simple skirt. There were no adornments or decorations to be seen and as she pulled it on, she noticed that it fit modestly, exposing only her hands and face. The clasps that held the back closed, however, were a bit of a problem. Two rows of hook-and-eye fastenings ran from the back of the neck to the level of mid-back, more than thirty separate closures which ended up taking her well over ten minutes to fasten because she didn't have a clue what her fingers was doing. Not as simple as appearances would have her believe, it seemed, yet it lay satisfyingly humble along her body, permitting her to feel nice and meek as was the intent.

Yet with meekness a definite lack of confidence came in toe. Plopping herself down at the vanity, she stared at her own reflection with eyes that betrayed festering feelings of anticipatory fright. Yes, she was afraid, as the slightly pinched expression the pale face in the glass displayed very clearly. Afraid of what she was allowing herself to be dragged into through – as she managed to grudgingly remind herself – her own willingness. After all, she'd mutely agreed to do as her guardian had suggested and walk right into a quite literal, and quite real, hell. Agreed without any forceful persuasion whatsoever. Perhaps she had gone mad? It didn't matter. Even if that were the case, she doubted very much that even the slightest touch of insanity would assist her in keeping her chin up when faced with a room stuffed to the brim with_ demons_.

Briefly, fleetingly, she pondered over whether she might be able to pull off illness, and therefore unable to attend the ball…but as soon as the idea came to her she shoved it away. Her warden may have been prettier than should have been allowed, but he was not stupid. He wouldn't fall for that, though she was vaguely sure that he would at least sympathize with her before pulling her through the door to her impending doom.

With a sigh, she shrugged the matter aside, her eyes falling to the assortment of cosmetics arranged on the surface before her. Despite a tiny grimace, she grudgingly rummaged through the selection until she found a plain white shadow, which she lightly dabbed across her eyelids. The mascara was thick, startling her into streaking a dark line down part of her cheek, which she scrubbed off with a detour to back to the bathroom and familiarizing herself with the sink, but once she figured out how to use it properly, teased her eyelashes into feathering and curling daring and dark against the white to make a play on shades of gray to match her clothing.

There was a soft knock at the bedroom door, followed shortly by a slightly muffled, "Lilith, are you awake?" She sprang to her feet, fluttering, mildly uncertain, before hurrying to open the door for him. It was that time already? Goodness, how fast the minutes went when all there was to be heard was the sound of her own thoughts. As she pulled the solid, beautiful wood back, she peered wide-eyed around it...only to find herself in a breathless state of enamored delirium.

He was dressed in purest white; a raiment of what appeared to be a fine, silk-linen blend. Loose slacks and form-fitted tunic embraced the long, powerful figure, the seams of which were trimmed with a deep, luscious violet satin. His shirt was of wispy silk, so thin it was almost translucent, clasped high at the throat and draping loose and full down his arms, gathered twice at elbow and wrist so the cloth was stylishly bunched, and the cuffs spilled across his hands like a froth of woven cloud. A cloak of black brocade had been thrown carelessly over the bend of an arm, an even match to the freshly-shined ebony riding boots that hugged his calves to the knee, and the heavy onyx-and-silver pendant that rested at his collar – a military cross, an iron cross.

The sheer amount of finery stunned her speechless, struck like a deer and staring like an idiot, marveling at the sleek contrast between the white and the pale gold of the hair styled loose and feathery about his nape and cheekbones. Violet eyes swept over and down her figure with a flash of color and light, his porcelain brow creased in curious concern, and he said softly, "you have not dressed yet—did you decide not to attend?"

The spell of glamour shattered by prompt confusion, Lilith spared a glance for herself. She had thought the dove gray cotton dress to be appropriate for a servant, which he had stated (for all intents and purposes) was the part she would need to play. Had she heard wrongly? Peering back up at him, worried that her mistake might irritate him, she answered hesitantly, "I did…"

To her immense surprise, he laughed – loud and amused and clear as a bell, his hand braced heavily against the doorframe as though it were the only thing keeping him upright. Upon regaining some amount of dignity, he let his hand flutter through the air in a casual motion to indicate her dress. "This?" When she nodded, if somewhat shy, he gave a firm shake of his golden head and told her bluntly, "no."

Come again?

"What do you mean _no?_"

He pushed passed her, stepping across the floor with a muted clicking of boot heels to approach the wardrobe and tossing his cloak aside, where it pooled dark and shimmering across the bedspread. "No as in _no_. You are not wearing that," he answered coolly, pulling back the wardrobe doors and gazing inside as though seeking something that would spur artistic inspiration.

She looked down at her clothes again, feeling the slightest bubbling of defensive indigence warming the pit of her stomach. "What's wrong with it?" she asked, her tone hard as she lifted her chin in defiance. He had some nerve to criticize her decisions like that after she'd agreed to all but putting her own head on a chopping block.

The angel's head whipped around to stare at her, eyebrows lifted to express something akin to horror as he stated shortly, "_everything!_ It has no color, no shape, no...it looks as though you are wearing a sack." Her stung glare glanced right off his back when he returned his attention to the clothes hung like jewels spun into fabric, that was until, "It is an insult to your beauty," happened to fall from his lips. The huffy glower melted into a blush within a manner of seconds. Calming and as patient as ever, his voice was pure reassurance as he explained generously, "you are my ward, Lilith, even if you are posing as something less. And I refuse to let you out in public dressed like that; you are supposed to be a consort, not a scullery maid. If anything, you should look as vain as I do." She might have smiled in response to that comment, entertained by his admittance of love for pretty clothing, had it not been followed by one that nearly made her cringe. "Take that thing off."

"I _beg_ your _pardon?_" she spluttered, her eyes staring into his back as though she hoped to be able to bore a pair of holes into him with the power of her gaze, resting her hands on her hips. There was no reason why she should have to change, in front of him especially, and she was going to stay this way. She'd chosen according to his information, so whose fault was it that he was displeased?

He turned, having selected an item from the wardrobe with a small noise of pleased success, to cast an amused eye back on her. Sighing, he folded the find over his arm and said firmly, "off with it, if you please." When she made absolutely no move to follow his request, he advanced, reaching with a quick hand around her back and pulled at the clasps that had taken her over a quarter of an hour to fasten. They popped open in one simultaneous second at the tug, fabric parting from her body as though the seam had neatly split.

Yanking away with and squealing, "ok, ok!" and quite obviously put out, she put her back to him before peeling the dress from her arms and dump it on the floor in a fit of bad temper. "There, happy?" She shivered, rubbing bare arms while she glared at him over her shoulder. She knew she should feel bashful, after all she was standing there in nothing but her underwear…but for some reason the embarrassment was nonexistent. Why was she so darned _comfortable_ around him?

Smiling in the face of her venom, he held out the garment that had found his approval. "Yes. Now put this on."

Lilith, still grumbling, snatched it from his outstretched hand and turned her attention to puzzling over how it was supposed to be worn, flatly ignoring his presence. Once she did, she decided that she would have very much liked to go back to the gray dress. The thing was a gown made of yards upon yards of a thin, watery, twilight blue satin. It draped loosely along the front, a generous, silky covering of cloth about her chest under the halter-styled neckline, that tightened slightly around her middle and hips to cascade down her legs in a waterfall of skirt. None of this bothered her…it was the _back_ that did.

There was absolutely nothing covering her back at all, leaving her bare from the base of the neck and along the slope of her spine and sides to just barely above curve of her bottom, where the layers of fabric bunched together to flow out behind her in a small train of dreamy, billowing satin. This, of course, meant that to coincide with the fit and style of the dress, she couldn't wear her bra.

Upon realizing this, she whirled around, piercing her guardian with very narrow eyes as she snapped, "I am _not_ walking around in public in this…" she searched for a word without success, the simple indecency just too much for her vocabulary to cover. "This is ridiculous! It's—it's just _wrong,_ and…and—"

"Scandalous?" he murmured in inquiry, his breath warm against her ear. She jumped – both alarmed and flustered by the furious beating of her heart – and wondered how on earth he could have gotten behind her so quickly. And then she froze, her breath catching thick with a gasp at her throat when fingertips brushed against her bare back, unhooking the clasp that held the underwear up around her ribs. "Is that how it feels?"

Unable to speak or move, she found herself riveted, her brain completely still and focused on what he was saying and doing, trained completely to the source of the odd rush of warmth just underneath her skin. "You are in hell. Down here, this is _modest._" With delicate ease, and with a little something else she wasn't quite able to understand, he sliced through the shoulder straps and slid the restrictive concealment of the lingerie out from under the front of the gown. Dropping it to the floor, he shifted, his hands resting on her bare shoulders in a way that offered her comfort and protection. "If I let you go in anything more under the public eye, you would more than certainly be found. Besides," he squeezed gently, large, warm hands holding her steady regardless of the sudden weakness in her knees, "you look lovely. Now sit here."

He indicated the chair at the vanity, which she took with an involuntary rustle of silken skirt. Fingers combed through her hair, deft and sure and delicate, assessing the situation with soft eyes that she could see in the mirror. Though she almost felt she should have been surprised, she wasn't, because he actually seemed to be enjoying himself as he whipped the thick expanse of her brown hair into an elegant knot at the base of her neck – fixing it in place with a handful of pearl and silver pins dug out of a drawer. He had her turn toward him then, and took a good long look at her face before palming three containers of eye shadow and asking her to close her eyes. When she opened them again, it was only to find that her eyelids had been brushed with two shades of blue, light and dark, and white to form sweeping arcs of color back almost to the temples. It was really quite striking.

Making a mild sound of approval in the back of his throat, he held out one hand and made a sharp tapping motion into the empty palm…and suddenly, filling out from nothing but air, there was a pair of shoes. Two satiny slippers of the same color and material as her gown; flat-heeled and glittering with silver embroidery sat cupped in his hand. These he presented to her with a small bow, watching her slip them on in silence before making the same summoning motion once more. This time she caught sight of a faint silver flash before he quickly hid his hand from her sight. She quirked an eyebrow at him, but he simply smiled and told her to stand.

Once she had, she found herself in the same position as before, her back to him as something cool touched her throat. Her fingers twitched with a reflexive response, wanting to touch the light weight spanning her neck, and then he was pressing a pair of earrings into her hand. A pair of tiny, glittering white jewels were suspended from the plain silver posts by a bit of thin silver chain, cold and sparkling. Suddenly she knew what was resting against her throat.

"Diamonds?" she choked, her throat quite dry. "Why are you loaning me your things? What if I break someth—"

He touching a finger to her lips and corrected, "not mine, yours. The jewelry especially, because it hardly does you justice." She felt her cheeks heat, the blush creeping down her neck. It was such a flattering way to tell her she looked pretty, she really didn't know how to respond to it other than to accept the gift by putting in the shimmering earrings, and then stare at her feet in embarrassment. The gift of rocks wasn't necessarily something she could remember regarding especially romantic, but she knew they were expensive, and he gave them as though they were worth so much more than a vague monetary price.

Something warm was draped over her shoulders, the cloak he had entered with, glossy black fabric coating her down to trail heavy on the floor. As if it had been a sign of something ominous, her stomach found itself clenched, nervous with alarm as she thought about what she was doing. Hiding...in a place that would be crammed with strangers. This was hell, as he had so casually reminded her before; the realm of sin, home to murder, rape, and thievery. What in God's name had she allowed herself to be dragged into? A shivery exhale slid from her lungs, not noticing that a meek, nearly silent whimper had escaped along with it.

But he had heard, and held her back when she turned to walk to the door, his fingers clasped around her wrist. Her glance was laced with confusion, yet he didn't let go, merely stated, "Lilith, I know you are frightened. I do not blame you in the least…but I beg you trust me. We are doing this to protect you." His eyes shifted, lilac darkening to deep plum and flushing with a soft tinge of blue, and she noticed that the white lids of those eyes had been highlighted with violet shadow with graceful lines of black to trace the lashes.

There was something magical there, in the colored powder, the eyeliner, the fact that he wore it so effortlessly, as though makeup was completely natural. It sparked a furtive hint of a reminder, a dancing trace of a morsel of memory that pranced out of reach just when she thought she might grab it and hold on. And before she knew it, it had gone. Yet still, as she looked up at that hauntingly familiar face, familiar in a way she didn't quite understand, no matter what her inhibitions were whining about, she couldn't help but feel safe under that steady, watchful gaze.

She nodded once, offering him a shy smile that displayed more bravery than she actually felt. "I know," she said, hushed and a little wondering. "I don't know _how_ I know, but I know."

A gentle sigh passed his throat and he adjusted his grasp at her wrist to a cultured cradle of her forearm, curving it habitually around his own as he guided her out into the library. "Stay close to me," he advised, "this will allow me to keep you safe and to hide you from anyone that might be looking for trouble. I will let you know if it is safe to let your guard down."

"Won't my tailing you everywhere look suspicious?" she questioned.

Pushing the main door open for her to exit the suite and cross the threshold into the hallway outside, he answered calmly, "it will seem that I am highly possessive…which I am." She didn't reply, not quite knowing whether she should find it amusing or menacing. With a ritualistic flick of magic to reset the locks behind him (more habit than need, for the rooms would be searched anyway), he adjusted his collar before taking her arm and leading the way down the corridor that led to the social quarters…and the ballroom.

The hallway was solid stone, floor to ceiling lit by the bracketed torches that gave off an eerie, flickering light. It twisted in so many directions and split off into so many other pathways that Lilith was lost almost the moment they turned down the second corridor of some open hall that she probably wouldn't recognize if she entered it again. The fear she felt at the prospect of her assignment increased with every step she took, but all she really wanted to think about was how much better she would feel when this was over, and tried to use the walking time to train herself into taking deep, even breaths. Mainly to keep from inadvertently hyperventilating.

One instant seemed to take an age to pass, the next it seemed that the angel was stopping her just outside of a large, wide archway that opened up into a small and empty room. Considering the size and grandeur of the arch that led into it, she was slightly taken aback by the rather unspectacular look of its interior, scanning it with almost a bit of disappointment that there wasn't anything prettier to look at there. Just an empty room, unused, and even a little dusty around the corners.

"This is where the acting begins." A trembling flutter rose in the pit of her stomach, an unbidden, involuntary response to the words spoken against her ear from where he stood just beside her, close enough to feel the weight of his presence with just a mere inch between them. Unnaturally aware of the close proximity, the warmth of his breath against her cheek and jaw, the gentle pressure of his hand on her shoulder, she tilted her chin toward him as he murmured his words of silk and song for her to listen to. "Don't be afraid," he assured softly, "even if you are found, I will not let anything happen to you."

Her stomach leap into her throat, grating against the frantic pulse of her heart as his hand slipped over her shoulder and under the cloak. The friction of fine fabrics made a delicious noise, but not enough to block out the slide of that warm, cultured palm down her bared back, slipping gently along the slope of her ribs and spine to rest just above her bottom – too high to be deemed inappropriate…but far too low to be completely innocent. Startled as she was by the obvious affection behind the gesture, her body's impulsive reaction distressed her even more. She felt overheated and slightly lightheaded, disoriented by the heat of that hand against her skin. What was more, she was bewildered to catch herself almost hoping for it to fall lower, for him to press her to the wall and touch her. Anywhere…everywhere.

She pulled back, disturbed by the completely involuntary and morbidly vivid surge of feeling raging through her, but he didn't let her move far enough away to appease the anxiety, simply he held her firmly to his side, denying her request for space. "I—" And then he was closer than he had ever been before; so close that his nose within a hair's breadth of her own, so close that their breath mingled and a feathery strand of his hair brushed a tiny line along her cheek. So close that see could see the brilliance in his eyes, amethysts carved from stars, completely and utterly bewitching. She lifted a hand to his sternum, not entirely sure what her rebelling body wanted to do with it, palm pressing flat to the muscle underneath cloth and dreamily playing with the idea of allowing her fingers to slip between the laces of tunic and shirt-front to touch the ivory-pale skin of his chest.

To sooth the tension that sang through the muscle and power beneath that pretty skin...

In another moment, he was pulling back, the daring hand withdrawing, a lengthy slide retracing the path already tingling like mad, to tuck under her elbow as he whispered, "remember, stay close." Then, without any further prelude, he towed her gently through the archway.

They stepped through what felt oddly like a sheer, invisible barrier of what could have been thin, airy cloth – then the scene beyond brightened and blazed with color as the room expanded into a spacious, extravagant (not to mention otherworldly) ballroom. Still completely confused by the pound of her heart against her ribs and the ache of a throat strained by taking hard, forced breaths – her senses reeling and her thought dulled – Lilith followed her guardian as he led her down a small number of stairs and to what was quite obviously a coat-check. But she could barely see the world around her for the daze in her eyes. Her head didn't seem to be filled with anything but him; the sensation of his tender hands on the flushed surface of her skin and the delicious scent of his breath.

She was jolted out of her strange daydream when approached by the female in charge of the check, was very pretty even with the tidy set of whiskers at her cheeks and the tabby cat ears that poked out from her elaborately-styled ginger hair. The stranger cast her guardian a very brief, somewhat surprised, curious glance, then turned a warm smile toward Lilith and held out empty arms. Lilith simply blinked at her, distracted by the feline features and having no idea what was going on. With a soft peal of chuckling, the angel beside her patiently plucked the garment from his ward's shoulders and draped it across the cat woman's waiting hands. Balking under the light chill whisking across her bare arms and back, she bit her lip against a scathing remark she felt like directing at him, knowing better than to voice her displeasure at being forcibly disrobed like a doll.

This was the lion's den…she had to play her part; that meant she was a servant, so she had better act like one. Shrinking in on herself, she lowered her eyes and shifted close to her guardian as he started off at a casual, strolling walk. A pleasure slave – that's was all she was tonight.

That had been the plan, anyway, keeping her eyes down as an inferior would, yet she couldn't quite resist peering around at her surroundings. The people of hell, colorful and flamboyant in their strangely modified bodies – a rat's tail here, a lion's mane there, one young man even had feet like a sparrow's – seemed to share a common love of brilliant colors and flashy embellishments of all kinds. It was a lurid sea of interesting people; talking, laughing, and carrying on amid tables of food and drink and obsidian walls draped with rich scarlet tapestries. Several couples in the center of the huge, open room were dancing to a rather bizarre tune that she wasn't familiar with.

Everywhere she turned there was something amazing, the sights split between the horrific and grotesque to the strikingly beautiful, and Lilith found herself unable to keep up with the flurry of movement and action surrounding her, swallowing her sense of comprehension like a riptide. The angel seemed to have no trouble at all. He moved through the crowded area with a practiced ease that seemed heartily unfair to her, nodding greetings and calling hellos over the accumulative noise of voice and music. She'd felt the stress in him, yet it he hid it well with a grace that seemed to carry over into everything he did. No one would have been able to tell unless he wished them to. Envious of his skill in masking such troublesome emotions, she stuck as close to him as she thought would be appropriate, watching as much as she could with wide, curious green eyes.

Once she almost collided with his back, when he stopped to exchange brief pleasantries with a pair of demons, one of which had a lovely ebony-crafted viola dangling from one fist. He was a male of fair, sensual, and quite sorrowful features highlighted and half hidden by the vividly styled taper of his hair. The color of that hair was marvelous, an odd charcoal grey washed with shimmering hints of a muted, ashen lavender, blended so seamlessly that the streaks seemed to make the strands two-toned like some holographic illusion. It made the skin showed off by the undone front of his button-down shirt look almost sickly, despite the faded repeats of the ash-purple color that seemed to naturally tint his lips and eyelids. Though she really did try not to stare, her eyes betrayed her, lingering on the dreary, nearly despairing edge to the set of the grey eyes that suddenly lowered from the angel he had softly greeted to look at her.

She hurriedly scrambled for an apology, wondering if she should bow or curtsey or something equally submissive that hadn't come to mind, yet the hypnotic rings of charcoal, stormy cloud, and ashy white of the man's irises softened when he looked at her, stopping her dead almost instantly. In the end, she didn't do anything of reverence, merely watched as the stranger with mystical hair gave her what could have passed for a very thin, unhappy smile. Then he turned back to the conversation at hand.

The female that had accompanied him was altogether quite lovely in her scarlet, bead-encrusted dress, daring and dazzling with gems to give sparkle to the flesh freed by a plunging neckline reaching almost to her navel. A gleaming mass of auburn curls piled atop her head like a rich, reddish crown, she was like a beautiful china idol of perfection. With her carved, graceful features, lush, pouty lips and as tall and slimly-shaped as any model would have killed to be, there were only two flaws to be found amid her fancy exterior. The first was the fae-like slant to her garnet eyes; the second, the cold metal she had in place of fingernails veiled in part by lacy, gem-studded gloves frayed open at the ends.

Having gripped the angel's forearm as he did hers in kind, she passed him a muted greeting accompanied by a quaint compliment. Demurely patting at her hair, she blushed prettily and scoffed at him before reaching out to pluck at his sleeves in a familiar, admiring way. "You angels," she clicked her tongue, "you always look so _good_ in white."

The angel laughed his reply to the sighed compliment, and it struck something inside Lilith that was not entirely comfortable. When he took a delicate hold of the woman's hand and touched a polite kiss to her knuckles, she discovered that it was a touch of envy curdling at the pit of her stomach, and was very much ashamed of herself. What gave her the right to be jealous of this, admittedly gorgeous, stranger? There was no reason to act so petty. Or so possessive...

"Morrigan, my dear," he told her, "you will always be stunning no matter what you choose to wear." His attention switched to the man next to her and he released her hand, instead using both sets of fingers to flutter and shape with an elegant pair of signs that didn't seem to be anything she would have recognized at an ASL convention. "And Merry Meet, Samael, Lord of Flesh and Grief."

"Blessed be," the man hailed, and his voice was surprisingly low and husky for his face; not necessarily unbefitting, but it made the observer regard him in a slightly different, and far more respectful, light.

Clasping the offered hand (after the stranger swapped his bow to join the instrument it belonged to), the angel studied the smaller man's eyes for a lengthy moment, inquiring gently, "how do you fare, brother?"

Grey eyes averted from piercing violet, and Lilith couldn't honestly blame him for looking away; the angel's gaze could be penetrating to the point of an almost indecent depth. It was the woman who answered, a soft hand gleaming with silver rested against the lean shoulder and her flirty face somber with sympathy. "He's doing all right," she reported quietly, squeezing lightly, and he gave her another of those sad, small smiles. "We took another trip to Greece yesterday, and the seas went all smooth and lovely for him. I think it helped a little."

The spark of violet magic that seeped between one man's palm into the other's fingers emitted a warming sense of peace, soothing and somehow heartening, a tiny gift of confidence to bolster the demon's unspoken mourning. "From the ashes..." he quoted, letting the end drop into quiet, during which Samael glanced back up and nodded once.

"Yes." Morrigan took his arm and began to lead him away, murmuring a reminder that he was supposed to join the orchestra, but not before he managed to voice the breath of a whispered, "thank you."

Twice more did the angel stop to socialize with small groups or pairs, but neither encounter proved very interesting to Lilith. Having an outsider's obliviousness and a great deal of inability to understand the majority of what was said led her to pay more attention to the colorful swirl of activity around her; and she wasn't bothered. No one spared her much of anything other than disregard, neither recognizing nor inquiring as to who she was, merely crafting their own assumptions as they went along. She wasn't spoken to, she was barely even given more than what constituted as indifferent glances from the demons that filtered passed, and that was just fine with her. It was much less stressful that way, and she hadn't expected to be treated as a guest, or even an equal.

Apart from staring around and gaping at all the finery and strange, eccentric people, she spent a good deal of her time trying to keep pace with a man who was far better at navigating in expansive groups than she was, not to mention had longer legs. She shuffled along behind him like a good, dutiful show-servant, one hand full of the dragging train of her skirt to keep from tripping and causing a scene. Yet for all the apparent casual, unbothered ease of his stroll, she could still tell that her guide and guardian was as tense as a cat geared to pounce. He put off the most nonchalant front in the world, and it was believable, almost enough to fool her along with the rest of them...but not quite. The set of his shoulders was just a little to tight.

It wasn't until they crossed paths with a foxy-faced demon with a thoroughly gelled mane of silvery spiked hair that he seemed even remotely more relaxed. And the lightening was so evidently clear that it was almost startling.

The unknown male turned as if on subconscious, obligatory acknowledgement, and didn't seem entirely very pleased with the overall situation, for the expression on his face was one of a draw mask of forced civility. His upper body a silky, rippling drape of ultra-fine satin and embroidered chiffon in pale, moonlight silver glittering with gold wrought into loosely braided trim and twisted into rich, ornamental clasps inlaid with burnished topaz stones. The garments were vaguely oriental in look, full of sleeves and high-collared, yet it was gathered and tucked in places to adapt the style to the wearer's own taste, and ended at mid-thigh. Yet for balance, and quite possibly to accent the man's mostly legs, a pair of spike-heeled boots hugged the flesh up to just beyond the knees. They seemed to be made of snakeskin, or something similar, yet...it was of no pattern or color of any snake she had ever seen before.

Snakes weren't usually silver-white...

"Your Infernal Highness," her angel hailed, performing a seamless reverence with a graceful bend at hips and back, sweeping one arm smoothly outward as a gesture of heightened, dramatic respect.

The demon's clever, angular face lit with a smirk, gold-painted lips curving and eyes glittering amber from between the thick, showy decoration of black about his lids. "That was pretty," he remarked, complimentary, yet somehow rather mocking with the very same breath. The gold powder and paint that brushed back from his eyelids and down his cheek-bones to fade back into skin shimmered and winked when he moved, creating a mesmerizing illusion of metallic scales patterned flat against his pale complexion. "This must be the only setting I could wrestle a bow out of you, hmm?"

"You know me well enough to answer that on your own," the golden-haired angel retorted, playfully returning the banter, if still a little tight about the lips.

With a derisive snort of laughter, the demon propped one hand at his hip and tilted his chin to glance toward the company his conversation partner kept. And then did a double-take, sending the punkish spikes of his hair fluttering like fine, silver-crafted needle blades. "Well, now! Nice to see you up and about so soon, sweetheart."

It took her a fraction of a second to realize that she was being addressed, and her eyes went just a bit wider than usual, enough to convey some semblance of alarm to the two males. She hastily copied the angel then, feeling that it would be safest for her to be as subservient as possible. Anyone who demanded respect enough for veneration from her guardian warranted even more from the likes of her, and so she filled both hands with skirt fabric and dipped a low, genuflecting curtsey, and was rather proud that she only wobbled a little bit on the way back up.

Warm hands cupped her shoulders, skin rendered rough from a multitude of activity tender against her flesh, and she could almost feel the blond man's voice shiver up from his chest as he said quietly, "I do not think she remembers you yet, Beel."

A look of comprehension crossed the pale, foxy face. "Ah, well that explains why she didn't try to claw my eyes out on sight. 'Thought for sure she'd try to maim me after watching me stab you through the back." He laughed, and the sound was a crescendo of a fine, metallic melody to match the shining rest of him while Lilith merely regarded him with a mixture of strangely involuntary bemusement and confusion. Then he made a short, terse, distinctly annoyed gesture toward the mass of other guests swarming amid the enormous ballroom, the look on his face having returned to one decidedly displeased. "I'd better go mingle some more. My lizard-senses detect that you don't want an excess of attention tonight."

"I would prefer to avoid it, yes," the angel agreed with little argument expressed, nodding briefly while relinquishing his hold on Lilith's shoulders. The release was slow, drawn out and almost grudging, lingering with a brush of his fingers to the nape of her neck, as if he was loathe to let her go at all despite not having any other choice for appearances' sake. "Do me a favor and let me know if your father shows up?" He held out one hand, and Lilith looked down to see the muted flash of a small, clear crystal sphere cupped in the palm for the other man to take.

"I doubt he will," the demon claimed, and it was just a little sour around the emphasis on skepticism. "But sure." The little orb dropped into his extended hand, and the exchange was so sly, such an expert collaboration of slight-of-hand tactics that the slip was completely masked from everyone around but her, since she happened to be paying extra special close attention, masked under the pretense of sharing another whispered murmur.

"We will see," was all her angel said before the demon drew away with a flippant wave and headed off with a glassy clicking of heels higher than any Lilith would have dared wear, the crystal efficiently hidden away somewhere secret amid the folds of his clothing. With calmly inquisitive eyes, she looked up at the angel's face, clasping her hands together to suppress the desire to sweep the stubborn strands of blond hair from where they fell across his eyes like a feathery veil, and met the firm smile that lit his eyes for her while the rest of his face remained ivory-straight and expressionless. "Come along," he ordered mildly, and she followed with neither question nor complaint.

Shortly, he paused in his walk to speak with a man whose long, snowy-white hair resembled a frozen waterfall and had legs like a striped white tiger, Lilith heard the sound of heated argument, of hushed voices gradually rising in volume. She turned, searching for the source of the discontent amid the flow of the party, and found them, several yards away, a pair of women having a rather terse discussion.

One was blonde and full-figured; her violently pink dress fitted to look like it had been painted to her curvy figure, thick blond hair a tumble of honeyed waves. The other was stocky and muscular, taller than the blond, her hair jet black and sectioned into cornrow-braids that fell like thin snakes to her shoulder blades and dressed strangely for a formal ball in tight trousers and surcoat all in blacks and blues. The dire-looking female seemed to be berating the blond for something, who was replying with a sort of pouting scorn as they quarreled. She caught only faint snatches of what was being said, something about _blood magic_ and _law._

"You'd better be grateful I don't haul your ass to the torture halls for breaking it," the dark-haired one snapped, and there was a growl to the undertone of the words, dark and almost bestial despite a thin-woven thread of control. "I don't think Qaspiel would mind if I asked nicely."

Tossing her hair so that it gleamed, the blond turned up her nose and retorted, "do what you want."

Before Lilith could amend the impoliteness of openly listening in on a private discussion by looking quickly away, the blond woman turned around and strode right toward her, deep blue eyes haughty and pinched with huffy irritation. Though she tried to get out of the way, their shoulders collided with a sharp crack of bone to bone, which jolted Lilith hard to one side with a tiny squeak of pain and apology, bobbing her head downward in the hopes of avoiding any sort of confrontation.

"Watch where you're going!" the blond berated coldly, the acid dripping from her voice thick enough to have killed had it been solid, and flounced off in her huff after slashing the lowly servant with a livid mascara-laden glare.

Sighing with relief for having escaped anything more serious than a hearty, and rather nasty, chiding, she rubbed her assaulted shoulder and turned back to her guardian…only to discover that he was not where he had been just moments before. In fact, she couldn't see him anywhere.

She nearly choked on her panic, her heart-rate spiking while she whirled around, trying to spot the familiar halo of golden hair and violet-trimmed white suit. Fear gripped her in iron claws, chastising herself most brutally for not paying closer attention to the man who had promised to keep her safe as long as she followed his request and stayed close to him. Yet he was nowhere to be found, even when she padded tentatively to and fro between several clusters of people. Stricken without the security lent her by his steady presence, she didn't know whether to run to look for him or to stay put...or to cry.

Attempting to see over the heads belonging to a group of cheerfully conversing demons by peering perilously on her tiptoes and partially losing her balance, she scrambled to regain it before falling to the ground in an undignified heap. A quick backward saved her face, but it also sent her careening straight into another body. With a heavy, mortified internal groan, she turned around and began to apologize to the victim of her folly. "I'm so—" The words died in her throat, stilling into a tight silence as her eyes met a pair of a pale, crystalline blue. They were beautiful eyes, light and glittering; but the pupils were those of a snake's, dark slits to halve the jeweled base.

The man's skin was a rich, espresso brown, his hair almost black it was such a deep shade of chocolate, and was slicked damply back against his skull to expose a face that was flatly and cleverly shaped…matching his eyes and their distinct likeness to some slithery reptile. "Hello, sugar," he crooned, grinning at her, and reached out to touch the tip of one long, sinuous finger to her chin. "Lost your way?"

Lilith stepped back, pulling immediately away from the stranger's far too friendly manner and far too sneaky, honey-coated tongue, suddenly very nervous and wishing she hadn't been born so short. "N-no," she asserted, stammering despite her efforts to keep her voice even, upset by her nonexistent courage. "No. Just looking for someone." That smile of his scared her. No matter if he was going to pretend to help her, there was something _wrong_ about him. Though the only deformities about him were his snakelike eyes and the slightly flat shape to his face, it didn't make him any less threatening.

"Of course you are," he purred, stepping to the right in order to twine around behind her as though she were a statue on display for him to appraise.

Her stomach lurched, bile coating the back of her throat when she felt his gaze rake down her body – disgust without reason soaking her insides. He was too close, way too close…but why couldn't she tell him to back off? Why had her tongue suddenly gone stiff as though turned to lead?

In a split, wrenching second, one of his hands sealed tight about her wrists and yanked her backward into the firm plane of his chest. She struggled alarmed, and was shocked to realize that he far outclassed her as far as strength went, powerless to stop him while his empty palm slid down her bare back. The edges of his nails scraped shallow and light against her skin, teasing with the touch; his face pressed into her neck, inhaling at the area near her jugular. "You're looking for _me._" She shuddered, revolted, trying to crane her head away as a long, thin tongue slid along her neck, the instinctual need to writhe and buck like an animal to escape a predator's clutches almost overwhelming. Still, something told her that such blatant desperation held in fighting would only make her situation worse.

Twice now this stupid dress had given her attention of a kind she hadn't asked for, yet this wasn't anything like before. While she had been unnerved by it at the time, the hands of her companion and guide had been warm and gentle, coaxing from her a thrilled craving for attention; a soft, teasing caress, like a kiss with skin instead of lips. Now, as this stranger…this predator groped at her through her clothing, she realized that she had _liked_ the angel's touch. Initially she had thought the man claiming to be her guardian angel was dangerous – and he was, but not in the same way this demon was. Not to _her._

Lilith knew that she hadn't the strength with which to fight her assailant off, nor did she have the voice to yell, because subconsciously she feared the widespread attention it would draw...which would have jeopardized the mission that had brought her here in the first place. So she did all she could think of: prayed with all her might that someone would take pity on her. He'd said that she wouldn't be hurt…surely there was _someone_ who would help. But maybe she was just fooling herself; this was hell, why would anyone care what happened to her? She was only a pleasure slave, after all.

...and then she felt her attacker freeze, his firm, serpentine body stiffening against where he pressed to her back. The pained hiss of breath against her cheek alerted her to the reality that the groping had stopped, though the fingers locked around her wrists had tightened to an almost bruising level. "I thought I smelled you on her," the demon muttered, an angry snarl wound within his tone.

"_You_ should have listened to your nose, _serpent_."

Her eyes snapped open, stunned by the familiar jerk of recognition. That voice…it was _his_ voice. He had found her! Not daring to move, she held her breath sealed tight in her lungs as the demon spat and hissed in a language that made her want to crawl somewhere and hide away from the world.

But the angel was having none of it. "Silence," he snapped, and the edge to that tone was of complete, unavoidable command, absolute authority and dominance, the fury of a horrible temper alight and sparking behind the words. "Take your filthy hands off her or I will _break_ them."

Silence stretched between the two males.

Lilith tried desperately to still the involuntary trembling of her limbs, but she really couldn't help it. On the one hand, she was terrified that some sort of brawl would result from the battle-of-wills currently raging like a repressed gale on an uncharted wind. On the other, the lingering note of his voice was…she didn't know _what_ it was. Thrilling. Awe-inspiring; born of a power and elegant strength that made her knees get weak and her bones go soft. Though her attacker obviously thought the ultimatum over, trying to conjure a way to come out of the situation with the upper hand, apparently he could think of no way in which to do so, for he slowly, if surely, released his grip upon her.

She pulled away, wheeling to see her guardian's hold around both the neck and lower arm of the other male tightened immensely; as though he knew no further reason to hold back now that she was out of danger. The reptilian demon's face contorted with a grimace derived from pain as his arm was twisted to a warped, tension-ridden angle, borderline on the brink of snapping clean. Fingernails digging into the demon's throat, the angel scolded with a deliberate, stony calm, "you should have thought more carefully, Asmodeus." His expression didn't so much a twitch while he pulled imperceptively backward on the captive's arm, resulting in a choked snarl so reminiscent of a trapped animal. "Did you seriously think I would put seals that strong on something I would let you play with? No. I don't think so either."

With a sick, flowing rush, the color drained drastically from her face as, with a quick and easy jerk, Azrael snapped back on the arm he held and broke the bone cleanly in two. The noise was horrific, harsh and violent, though there hadn't seemed to be enough force exerted to result in such a sound. The arm was released, dropped as though it was as worthless as a piece of trash, only for the weighty, crushing force of the grip to tighten around the fragile neck and windpipe. She stared at the broken limb hanging useless and grossly mangled at Asmodeus' side, horrified and fixated and sure that she couldn't have really seen what she just had.

The look on her protector's face when she ventured a wide-eyed glance toward it was no less than startling. Terrible, storming anger clouded the usually so gentle, collected visage, his eyes turned a dark, tempestuous burgundy that displayed absolutely no remorse of any kind over what he had done to the other man.

This, she knew, was _no_ act.

"As a precaution against later occurrences," he stated quietly, almost pleasantly in a cool, cordial manner – as though the two of them were merely discussing something as mundane as the weather, "I give you fair warning. Touch my property again and I will make what Raphael did feel like a mere paper-cut. _Do you heed?"_

While it was certainly grudging, there wasn't much more hesitation involved before the demon quickly nodded with a wordless gulp around the fist crushing down on his trachea. Then the fair-haired male let him go, stepping serenely aside and allowing the scowling Asmodeus to stalk off, seething, and cradling his broken arm. Keen eyes followed the departing demon's back, calm violet flushed with deepest scarlet of suppressed, violent fury, watching like a hawk while Asmodeus strode away, pushing roughly through the throng of people. Anger radiated in heated waves from both males, but only one was victorious. Though a demon's wrath was terrible, it was nothing next to that of a vengeful angel.

_Holy hell. _

Who _was_ this man who went to such lengths to protect her?

A long, quiet minute passed. _Too_ quiet, Lilith noted, and she hesitantly turned, peering over her shoulder at the scattered number of distorted faces turned her way. It was only a few, those who had been near enough to witness and overhear the margin of conflict between two of their nobles, yet all of them – those whose attention had been drawn – were openly gawking at her; a slight, plain, brown-haired human girl in their midst…in_ their_ territory. The blood that had briefly attempted to return to her face instantly drained into an ashen pale as she stared back at the curious bit of a crowd, wide eyes reflecting the fear that raged within her body, making her want to either shrink into a small, unnoticeable lump or flee for her life. Or she would have, if only she could have made her petrified body move.

She uttered a frightened yelped when she was grabbed by the wrist and spun around, her unsteady feet sending her tumbling into something hard, with just enough give to be less than completely alien. The pressure of lips pressing against her open mouth was completely alarming, and she automatically obeyed her first reflex to jerk away. But somehow he seemed to know she would do just that. Unwilling to let her defy him, he slung one strong arm around her hips and pulled her forward to press her body tight to torso; every inch of him dominant, powerful male.

There was…a pounding in her head, throbbing as though she had a migraine so intense that it was just a hair's breadth short of splitting her skull wide open. Her temples ached, her brain reduced to pulsing with contraction-worthy shudders. Completely distracted by the rigid shock of pain, she was unable to focus on the kiss being given her. Her eyes didn't see the face she had learned to associate with a strange man known only by way of some diluted, internal recognition – the one without a name. Instead she saw a face that she knew right away, familiar and wonderful, the name teetering on the very edge of the cliff that was her memory…a fresh, relished taste at the tip of her tongue.

Autopilot wanted her to gravitate away from the hand that clasped firmly around her forearm, and it was a whispered word that reached her ears – a word that meant nothing and everything to her – that brought her to relaxed.

_Mae' bre'eve..._

Driven by nothing but impulse she couldn't control, her arms lifted, blind, searching hands slipping up the front of his linen-draped chest to wrap around his neck, eyes flickering closed with surrender to the bliss. Heat needy and thick like liquid was surfacing somewhere inside her, a burning that threatened to consume her unless she got closer…unless she got more. Her body curved, supple and sweet to the structure of his as she pressed herself into the cage of iron and satin. His arm tightened around her waist, the fingers of his opposite hand curling under the flesh the thigh that was suddenly lifted to flex against his own, tilting his head to deepen the angle of the kiss that grew to consume anything and everything else; desperate with desire unleashed in that single, fever-stricken moment.

She felt the faint before it hit her; a sickly, swooping rush of air and blood to her temples approaching on sterile white wings. Pulling away with a gasp thirsty for breath, she forced herself to focus, searching for the eyes of the man who still held her so close – feeling the hand against her cheek which helped to hold her head up. Green met dusky violet in a familiar clash of color and emotions so different that they were completely the same. And suddenly, she just knew.

"_Azrael…_" she breathed, the word a syllables rolling slow and heavy from her tongue just before her brain abandoned its grip on consciousness in favor of reverting to the calm black of sleep. A sleep she had long awaited; knowing, once again; who, what, and where she was…and who was watching over her. She fell without fear, her entire being relaxed, locked inside the soft repose of peace – and much more importantly, of trust.

Using quick reflexes, Azrael snatched her clear of the floor as she collapsed and swung her up into a bridal carry. His eyes, near-white with alarm, flashed up to the crowd that had gathered, a name on his lips and ready to call – but Pandora was already at his side, champagne-colored gown shimmering gently like bright fish-flesh in the torchlight. A subdued murmuring had risen from the scattered assortment of onlookers, a restless noise both surprised by what they had witnessed and just itching to begin gossiping about it. Since when did the prim, socially-wary Lord of Death go around kissing the damned in public? Had he finally cracked and sunk to their level of hedonistic politics? But the fair, stoic angel and the small, fiery medic ignored the isolated bustle of whispers around them, continuing to examine their patient with nothing more than a thin shiver of concern to jostle their indifferent calm.

The redheaded female pressed the palm of one hand flat to the unconscious Lilith's forehead, the fingers of her other skimming over temples, forehead, and neck, her brow slightly furrowed. "What happened?" Azrael prompted when Pandora didn't speak for a long while, still gently cradling the dark-haired young woman in his arms as though terrified his effort to dive off the suspicion that could have drawn too much unwanted attention to his show of temperamental possession had broken her.

Decisive and looking considerably less strained than he felt, Pandora straightened and regarded the worried angel with a small smile. "She's perfectly fine," the medic informed him in a matter-of-fact tone, "in fact, I believe she's just gotten her memory back…which appears to have sent her entire body into restart-mode. Poor thing," the she patted Lilith's head with a gentle palm, "she's had a rough couple of days. This sleep will be good for her." Turning away, Pandora instructed quietly, "take her back to rest. Make sure she stays in bed for at least two days—more if she needs them, and watch her for any remaining damage from the transporting process. She should be just peachy in a week…maybe sooner if she's as resilient as you make her sound." With a parting pat to his shoulder, she had gone, wandering idly through the now disinterested (and quite happily gossiping) citizens to sling a casual arm around the shoulders of the violet-haired Balberith who was chattering idly with Marius and Mamon.

Azrael nodded once, vaguely, yet his attention had already moved from the departing Pandora and onto the young woman cradled in his arms. Memory back…that would be a wondrous relief. Her ignorance of their real relationship had been painful – especially in those moments when he had felt her figure go tense, drawing subconsciously away from him due to a shadowy remnant of uncertain apprehension. He had grown accustomed to her gentle affections, only to have them ripped away right along with her recollections of everything she had already learned and registered. It had been his name on her lips before her consciousness was lost, and that was sure to be a good sign, but he wasn't sure he could truly be at ease until he saw her smile for him again.

He sighed quietly, and pondered how he was going to get Lilith out of this mess and back to his rooms without being caught by the guards. He would have to be quick, and he would have to be careful. It would be preferable to avoid it; but if she was found out, he would have no option other than to protect and defend her, but challenging the authority of the hellish police was dangerous business. Not for him personally, but for the delicate state of the peace stretched like worn canvas between the heart of the realms. Perhaps if he... The heart squeezed painfully tight within his chest when his eyes shifted along the line of inattentive faces to meet irises of a deep, stormy blue.

_Oh, damnation above. _

How poetically ironic; the very person he had been trying to avoid by pulling this crazy stunt, the chief of hell's army herself.

Nergal's face remained impassive, however, her sharp, calculating eyes briefly scanning the guarded watchfulness of his expression from where she stood there at the edge of the gradually dispersing crowd. Then the very corner of her mouth lifting in a slight, wryly sardonic smile – one of her jeweled eyes flashing in a subtle wink as she turned to her left, barking, "Jeqon." Barely a split fraction of a second passed between the summon and the immediate appearance of the man who stepped out of the shadows to crouch silent and dark at her side, soot-black hair falling across his face as he waited for the instructions to come. "Announce to the rest of the Ghosts that our work here has been completed, then send a runner to my quarters so that I may send our findings to His Majesty. I'll follow momentarily, I have an errand to run."

Without even the whisper of a sound, the male stood, turned, and melted back into the crowd to fulfill his orders with an acrobatically catlike grace, his stark black uniform inconspicuous even for its simple dark against the vibrant color of the other fashions in the room. The angel's eyes followed him briefly, recollecting something regarding the demon and his quest for a psychiatrist. Never once would the cat-man show it, but there _had_ been something a little tight about the line in his back. How odd.

"Findings, Nergal," he murmured softly, shifting his grip around his unconscious charge to cradle her closer to his torso. Though hardly anything in his posture showed it, he was nervous. Nergal had a lot of power. Being a military leader, she held more knowledge of the unholy realm's security and defense systems than anyone else in existence; she also happened to be on the very short list of people the devil actually trusted, even if only a little. Lucifer didn't trust anyone all the way, so that was something to brag about. Her power could either greatly benefit him…or drag him into a situation that could bring about another holy war. True, he had never given her good cause to want to cause him injury, but that had never much mattered to her before.

Nergal had been the angel of divine retribution during her days in heaven, but being such had uncovered a rather nasty flaw in her makeup; a fetish for destruction and chaos. She had been shown mercy by the Almighty – though her power had been put under a sort of mental binding to prevent any accidents – but Nergal had chosen of her own volition to fall to hell with the demoted Lucifer and his followers. No one truly knew why she had done so…it could not have been solely for the sake of her siblings for there had been no love between the aristocratic Nergal and her sadistic little brother Asmodeus, and there had been naught but animosity and hatred between she and her younger sister Nisroc.

But she had fallen all the same, her wings taken and replaced by the form of a great demon wolf for her surrender to Michael's less than tender care. Though her brother had been forced to rely on his half-serpentine form almost solidly, Nergal had been granted choice to use her secondary body when she wished, though she was required to change at the rising of every full-moon. The king of hell had appointed her the head of his personal guard and his spy system, which had been one of the wisest decisions he had ever made. As proud as she was, she was also somewhat fickle when it came to her personal choices, which made the current situation dangerous.

"What findings are these?" he asked her, almost dreading the answer. If she chose to out him…all hell (no pun being intended) would break loose. He would have to blow his cover and fight her.

With a short jerk of her chin, the soldier indicated that he should walk in the direction of the main entrance to the ballroom. He did so, keenly aware of the stocky female keeping even stride with him as he began to navigate through the crowds. Difficult as it would have been while carrying Lilith, with the famed-to-be-brutal Nergal's presence he had no trouble whatsoever; the citizens parted for her as the waters of the Red Sea hadsupposedly parted for Moses. "Hm…you mean _lack_ of findings," she answered, tone dry. Her voice was husky and low for a woman's, very slightly touched with an edge of cruelty, but not all that unpleasant. "My report consists of _nothing to report_ and _walls in sector five need attention_."

Azrael glanced at her when he paused to collect the cloak left at the coat-check, graciously thanking Bastet as he did so, and suddenly found it much easier to breathe. "For a moment," he mused as he set off toward his rooms, Nergal beside him, though she was careful to keep from bumping Lilith's dangling feet, "I thought you were going to raise the alarm on me."

"Ah, but why would I do that?" A downright wolfish smile was shot in his direction, elongated canine teeth shining white in the flickering torch-glow. "I have nothing to gain from hurting you, Shinigami. Besides, you were one of the ones who vouched for me when I…lapsed." Her face tensed briefly, obviously recalling her accident in Germany those years ago.

But it hadn't been _that_ long, he remembered; the Second World War had been the mortal war he had given himself reign for the most involvement. He remembered the suicide of Adolph Hitler with a sincere and somewhat bemusing sense of pride, it having been one of the rare moments when he had been glad of his job, where he could be the one to strike down the hand of evil, even when in the middle of a war. Wars had always depressed him…a serious condition of his, but he knew very well that Nergal had suffered from the post-war massacre more than he had. She, after all, had been responsible for the firebombs dropped on the undefended and virtually helpless city of Dresden due to a lapse of control in her own power.

He knew better than to say anything, despite the returned flare of sympathy. She still had the ability to turn his ward in to her master if she wished, and he felt it wise to avoid upsetting this rare mood of cooperation. "I thank you," he murmured.

She paused with him outside his rooms, helping him to keep hold of his burden while he performed the necessary spells to unlock and open the door, her gaze strangely quiescent when it rested briefly on the lolling head of the hybrid girl. But as she left, for the first time in a long while, he heard her give a remark that wasn't half bitter scorn or acidic sarcasm. "Don't think on it. I did it because no one deserves the fate that would have been hers had I not. Humans are not toys. I've always thought as much."

Dear lord, that bordered on _treason._ She was fortunate for having the freedom to make such decisions. As valuable to Lucifer as she was, he wouldn't risk getting rid of her…and very few kept such comfortable positions.

Then she shrugged, the pensive moment dissolved, and tossing her braided hair over her shoulder as she turned away. "But don't think I'm going soft, now, you hear?"

His "understood" was uttered with the laughter of deep-set relief to fortify it.

By the time be got Lilith inside, Nergal was long gone, leaving him to maneuver his armful of girl through the door on his own. After shifting to see her safely beyond the opening into his suite and relocking the main door, he carried his precious cargo through the library and passed the long hallway beyond to enter his own bedchamber. Without even a moment's hesitation, he lay her down with a soft rustle of satin against the bed sheets. Gently ridding her of shoes and jewelry, and slowly, carefully removing the pins that fastened up her hair, he fetched a set of warmer, more comfortable clothes for her from the room he had given her.

The flannel shirt and slacks he selected proved suitable, and as he returned to his sleeping ward, he set to changing her attire without hesitation. Taking a great amount of care not to jostle her too roughly, he maneuvered her limp, passive limbs into the clean slacks underneath the skirt, slipping the garment up to the hips and buttoning the shirt over the bodice. He did this to prevent her body from taking dislike to any rapid change of temperature...and also to prevent any discomfort on his own part. Unlacing the tie held at the back of her neck, he then persuaded the dress to slip from her body, the beautiful blue material following his wishes with ease, and draped it over the foot of his bed.

Even after pulling a few blankets over the sleeping girl, Azrael found his attention linger with her for quite a while; seated on the edge of the mattress, still in his formal clothes, absentmindedly stroking the back of her hand as he listened to the soft, patterned sound of her breathing. She belonged there…in his bed, in the heart of his personal haven. And what was more, she was _safe._

He couldn't deny that he was immensely relieved. With Nergal's word of fealty to his cause, he knew that he needn't worry about any of the five soldiers beneath her. The Ghosts were formidable forces separately, but their loyalty to their leader was absolute – none of _them_ would betray him to Lucifer. And even if the king of hell did discover what he had done, Azrael's list of allies was long indeed, including even the oldest and strongest of His Majesty's own sons. There was little chance now of harm coming to his lover. He had strong faith in the granite-like walls he had instinctively built around his little human charge.

_Of course,_ he mused warily when he stood to change his clothes to a more comfortable combination, _there is always the chance that something goes wrong. _

And the likelihood of that chance exploding into life was far greater than he would have liked.

* * *

**Hello! :D **

**One quick announcement; due to nearing the last few weeks of spring quarter and being a lousy student to begin with, I probably won't update for at least two weeks so I can make sure and get my classes passed and get my credits. Believe you me, I don't like it any more than you. I'd much rather be working on this than school. Blergh.**

**I hate school.**

**ANYWHO! Gawd almighty this chapter used to suck; I'm much happier with it now. And we met so many new subcharries too (There are an epic ton of characters in the MH world, let me tell you, it's nutty)! Several of these we'll see again later, on-and-off as everything progresses. In most cases those that were being greeted and/or spoken to here are allies in some shape or form, and were introduced here to give the story some realistic character-person-depth...and to flesh out the world itself. And YES, I put Beelzebub in spike heels. Hush, you know it's hot.**

**Someone caught it! Pandora is indeed from the Greek story...but not in the way you might think. That'll come later. And I think I made the deal with Claire a little easy, but that's ok :) I will explain "soul-seeing" and other powers found among mortals, like Empathy and stress-recovered-divinity, as time goes on in small increments. I started way back, actually, and it probably won't get much clearer until a little while later, but it will eventually!**

**Someone asked why Lilith was the only one punished for becoming a hybrid instead of punishment going to Azrael for actually doing it. All I'm going to say is, like in the real world, there is as much corruption, doubt, unfairness, and nasty loopholes here. Not everything's perfect, and not everything makes sense. Part of it's ideally to try and make the human not want to go through the procedure, and part of it's something else...yup.**

**As for Lucifer...you really think I'd just leave it at what I gave you last chapter? Nonononono, we haven't heard the last about him; the commentary there just happened to be biased by emotional narration directed from Azrael's POV. Luci is definitely NOT so simplistic as untilmate-take-over-the-world-evil-without-real-purpose-other-than-because-I-can. You'll see, lovelies ;)**

**Well...methinks that'll be all for now, my dears. But aren't we happy she's got her memory back?! HUZZAH! Told you it wouldn't take long. **

**So, please take a moment to review, ask me questions about why I'm such an idiot and describe clothing religiously...uhh, hmm... -cough-**

**Until next time! **


	39. Beware the Nightfall

**Chapter 57: Beware the Nightfall**

* * *

Sluggish and warm under the thick haze of sleep drawn over her like a blanket, her body felt extraordinarily heavy. She was so tired that her eyelids didn't want to lift. But that was strange, for she didn't remember going to bed. What she _did_ remember was coming home from work and talking to Azrael, he had been upset about something and she had tried to cheer him up. After that, there was nothing but a blank patch, the pieces blurred by tears and powerful, throbbing emotion that she couldn't explain or clarify with a drowsy brain. The very last thing she could recall was the water. The water that had made her vision dark and silent. The water that had pushed her down into crushing depths of material pain, flooding in her lungs and choking her breath as she tried to scream – clawing and kicking – just before everything around her had gone awash with black.

The _water!_

She threw her body forward at the same time her eyes snapped open, sitting up to stare around, disoriented with alarm. A snap of pain shot up her neck and slapped her temples between something that felt like hard stones and she fell back with a groan, squeezing her eyes tightly shut. In no less than a moment she realized that her body was shaky and overheated, her hands and knees trembling as efficiently as if she had been injected with enough caffeine to slow a fully-grown horse, blood pounding in her ears, eyes, and throat as though it were trying to strike her absolutely senseless. Unable to see for the pain striking her head, even the soft light she had been able to catch had burned her retinas deeply enough to have been the full blaze of the sun.

It felt like everything a hangover had ever been described with…and God, did it _hurt_.

"Easy now," a cool hand touched her fevered forehead and then her cheek, gently sweeping the hair back from her face as it gauged her temperature. "We've no need for you to hurt yourself again." He spoke softly, voice hushed in a manner that reminded her of dark-shaded velvet, as though he wagered that any more volume might hurt her. The tone was like a gentle melody, easy on the ears and making her conscious sparkle with recognition. It felt good, both his touch and his voice; soothing and soft, calming, and almost seemed to ease some of the pain that stung the inside of her skull with nothing but the mere contact.

Lilith opened her eyes again, slowly this time to let her sight adjust to the light, and let her gaze fix to the face that had bent over her in concern. A bare moment later and she found her lips curving into an automatic smile. "Hello."

She peered cautiously around, taking in the silk-and-gauze-draped bed upon which she lay and fingering the soft weave of the blanket that gave her warmth, heartily glad for it despite the fever that seemed to burn her up from the inside. It was a room she felt certain she had never seen before, all cool gray stone and somber hues, splattered with deep, rich colors within the paintings that hung on the walls and the drapes of the bed. The wood accents were deep, beauteous ebony and the rugs a plush black velvet, the bed large and elegant and comfortable. At the same time, she understood that she had been there once before, even if long ago…it was a given fact, though she knew it was impossible. "It worked..." she murmured, realizing that this, in all its lush, closed-in glory, was a part of hell.

Lavender darkened almost immediately, flushing with a pretty blue. "Ah, so you remember me?" his voice was pleased while it lilted in humor, his smile warm as he sat down on the edge of the bed, taking care not to jostle her achy body. "_Aa,_ it worked. Despite slight complication." With a steady adjustment of weight, he shifted to lie down across the mattress next to her, bracing his upper body with his forearms to keep his torso and head above hers. One hand still fussed with her hair, filtering strands of it through gentle fingers. It was comforting to have him doing so, easing the ache that pounded within her skull...but what it _didn't_ ease was the question she had.

"Why didn't I remember you, Azrael?" she could have laughed, but the effort caused her a spasm of pain, and she halted before it could rip through her skull like a cleaver. "That must've taken some work."

The fingers wound amid her hair paused, but he offered another smile to brush away any tension. "I was worried that I would leave you too long so I pulled you from death too quickly…and you left your memory behind for a little while." He let out a sigh lined with the bemusement of the slightly humbled, "had I known all I needed to do was kiss you to shock you back, God knows I would have done it much sooner." And he let his torso drop forward onto the pillows.

Though she was not exactly sure what had happened while her memory of him had taken a vacation, she understood enough to gather that the events having transpired had worn her guardian out. He looked tired and ruffled, as though he had been raked rather thin during the past few days. They must have made a fitting couple. She herself felt as though she had been pulled through a currycomb a good three times.

Yet despite his obvious relief for the return of something remotely close to normalcy, she felt almost as though she had caused him unnecessary stress. She knew intellectually that it hadn't been her fault, after all she hadn't wanted to make things even more difficult for the poor man by accepting the gift of immortality, but a part of her still felt guilty. Scooting closer to him was a little difficult, but she inched along without too much pain until their sides were just barely touching. A gentle hand touched the line of his back. Instinctually the muscle shifted beneath her palm, automatically responding, gone briefly tense under his loose blue shirt before he completely relaxed under her touch.

It was her first reaction to gain pleasure from the faithful, communicated sense of peace her hand had brought him. The second was far less lighthearted. "I'm just curious...why did you have to drown me?"

His eyes were somber, tinged with gray around the outer ring of the irises when he glanced her way before shifting to prop up his chin with one arm. From her prone position she kept her eyes on his face, patiently waiting for him to speak. Had she been any healthier she would be wriggling with curiosity, tugging at his sleeve for information like a little girl, eager to learn about the great power he had used to grant her wish. Now, she just watched, serene and silent until he spoke, "Immortality is forced into the body through a trauma that is found at the very brink of death and acceptance of that death, followed by the applicator shoving a massive amount of _Mana_ into the soul before pulling it back just before it actually dies—_Mana_ being highly potent and personal magical energies. Water is a lubricant as well as an enhancer of power, and it serves as an opener into the immortal realms."

Azrael actually looked rather guilty, his gaze apologetic as he explained further, "it's the only way to do it. The process is dangerous, and I couldn't know that you would make it through so I thought it best not to tell you beforehand to limit the fear you may have felt." There was a brief pause while his fingertips brushed soft and faint against the curve of her cheek and he added, almost childlike with inquiry, "are you…angry?"

It was with a decent amount of humility and awe that she looked back on the incident. She could remember some of it, most significantly the fear and the tiny stab of hurt from the disregard he'd given to the way she had fought him. The way he had ignored her airless demands to let her up, that she didn't want it anymore, had been terrifying. Subconscious fear responded to the description and the memory of nearly drowning at the hand of her own guardian and made her body want to put distance between their bodies. But she knew better. Miraculously, he had obeyed her request, and he had used the only thing he'd known to survive the process – elemental detachment – and it had worked. Did it really matter now how he'd done it?

She was immortal now. Never would she leave him to suffocate in despair and loneliness. Never again would he have to fear it, thanks to the strength of will he retained within that godlike power inside him. "No," she told him finally, her thoughts clear, undaunted by the pain his very presence seemed to repel. "No, I'm glad you didn't tell me. I'm such a coward, I wouldn't have done it then…and I'm glad that I did."

"You, my dear," he praised softly, his lips against her forehead, "are _no_ coward."

Lilith's smile was small, touched by the pride she heard within his tone, but she still felt uneasy. She couldn't even begin to imagine how she would have felt had she come home to find him unaware of who or what she was to him, it would have torn her apart. Never mind what he insisted, she wasn't so naïve as to believe he had been only marginally bothered by it. She knew him too well for that. "I'm sorry for making you worry," she whispered, her eyes flickering closed.

"Don't be. It was no fault of yours." He looked up, sharp eyes scanning her face as though making doubly sure that she truly recognized him before he brushed a quick kiss to her lips. The touch lingered for a long moment, his mouth soft and tender, as if relieved by the feel of her skin. "Go back to sleep," he ordered quietly, visibly pleased with her reaction to him – a happy, if tired, smile.

She no longer hurt quite so vividly, but even the small splurge of conversation had taken its toll and she knew she needed more rest. Yet: "Only if you stay with me," she answered, her hand unconsciously fisting into his sky-colored shirt. "Please?"

Compliantly, he closed his brilliant eyes, lying back down and tucking a strong arm across her waist to coax her body into curling smoothly with his figure as neatly as the corresponding pieces of a puzzle might. He nuzzled his face, very gently, into the crook of her neck, a thrum of magic expelled to sooth the ache in her head and spine adjoined to the contact. Warming her, a human (or, human-shaped) pillow, he was firm and loving, everything she needed. "Welcome back, Lilith," he murmured against her throat, purring like a cat.

It was the last thing she knew before sleep claimed her for the second time; safety, warmth, and love.

* * *

She had lain awake for some time, she didn't know how long, her eyes closed and on the teetering edge between sleep and wakefulness, still a bit sleepy. The brief scan she'd taken of her lightly-battered body proved positive, a little achy in one or two places, but the splitting pain had left her skull and spine in peace which more than made up for a few sore muscles. A yawn pulled at the tendons in her jaw and neck, one hand rubbing idly at the mar of an upset hamstring while she stretched her back. One of her eyes had flickered open to check the time, hoping there was a clock within the nearby vicinity, and she had almost been thrown into a state of physical shock by what she had seen.

Squinting, she made a faint noise of alarm and pain for the sake of bewildered retinas. Then, slowly, she let her eyelids side back from the bright green irises they guarded, almost experimentally letting them open again. She hadn't been imagining things.

Brilliancy. Sheer, vivid brilliancy. Every light and shadow was as pronounced as if she were looking at a black sheet of paper on a sterile white surface. The scraps of color scattered about the somber mood of the room flared into beautiful clarity, striking and sharp with a depth she never should have been able to pick out from where she lay. It was startling, and she was frightened at first, thinking that something was wrong with her eyesight. But that couldn't be it, for she was seeing much more _clearly_. How strange…

She shifted, peering up at the wall parallel to the bed, and jumped in surprise at the loud shushing sound that reached her ears. Freezing like a defensive deer, she peered around at the darkened bedroom, eyeing the black shadowy corners for whatever had made a noise. There was nothing there, or anywhere within the enclosure of cold, canvas-dotted stone walls. When she felt safe to move again, the sound repeated, a stiff slide of cloth from the area spread across her legs. _The rustle of the sheets,_ she thought, calming once she recognized the source, _but why so loud?_ It was as if her senses had been accelerated to a point beyond normal human capability.

Then it clicked. She could have laughed at her unreasonable initial panic. Of course she could hear and see better, she was _immortal_ now, it made perfect sense for her body to have changed this way. She really should have expected that she would, after all the explanations of the differences between the perceptions of a mortal and those of an immortal – it was just that she hadn't quite linked this change in a possibility with herself. Quite distinct in her memory, she could recall an incident when, despite pitch blackness that had rendered _her_ blind to everything around her, her angel guardian had led her along as though the light had been the broad day sun of noon. She had know how sharp his senses were; sight like that of a cat, able to hear even the softest noise uttered beneath silences heavier than the night, heightened touch, taste, and smell. Who would have guessed that she, too, would be able to possess such abilities?

_She_ certainly hadn't.

A noise with the sure rhythm of footsteps pricked at the rear of her attention, quieter than those of a human, quiet and light and familiar. She knew that pattern, the muted tap from the heels of a pair of well-loved boots. They would be black leather, supple and soft with well-worn love, laced up the front and fitted from foot to just below the knee. That was a little weird…how could she know him just by the sound of his step? Weird, yes. Also a little fun. Sure enough, the bedroom's ebony door pushed open to reveal Azrael, looking much less disheveled today and dressed in deep green cotton and stone-colored jeans. He smiled at her over his shoulder as he gently closed the door behind him, and in that moment she was faced with a brazen reminder of just how much she loved him.

His hair was unbound today, hanging in loose, silky tresses nearly down to his shoulders – bright against the dark shade of his old-style shirt and streaked with white feathers at the nape. It was another shock to her newly sharpened eyesight, the sheer splendor of pale, glimmering skin and piercing eyes. Her own eyes had required some rapid adjusting to grow accustomed to the soft glow that he let off under the light he created to burn inside the lamp hanging from the ceiling above their heads. She hardly minded. Merely looking at him was enough to stroke the giddy happiness that filled her when she was with him. The smile alone was enough to make her heart thump hard against her ribcage like a skittish bird.

Sitting gently down on the edge of the bed he reached out and touching the back of his hand to her forehead, and then to her cheek, feeling for her temperature. She closed her eyes and leaned into the measuring contact when it turned to the lingering sweep of a caress, delighting in the texture and gentility of his skin to her face. "Good," he smiled again in the face of her affection, the expression calm and lovely, "your fever has gone down enough for you to eat safely. Here you are," he passed her the bowl he held cupped in one hand, a mild white ceramic filled with thick, rich porridge studded with dried fruit and stirred light with cream.

She took it from him, her hunger suddenly growling like an locked inside her belly. As she lifted the bowl to inhaled and relish the smell of hot food, the first thing she registered was the heat of it before she choked on the air and pulled her face away. Even with the space between her throbbing sinuses and the bowl, the scent of the porridge continued to force through her nasal passage like a lethargic battering ram. In fact, she almost swooned – a reaction only hindered by the hand Azrael used to steady her by gripping tight to her shoulder – dazed and shocked by the vivid scents of fruit and cream and honey still reverberating in her brain.

"It's so strong," she mumbled, pressing a pair of fingertips to her forehead while she blinked down at the bowl with incredulity wide in her eyes. Everything was so powerful! Sight, hearing, smell…what was next?

The laughter that flew from his throat was loud and clear while he relaxed and leaned backward into a comfortably lounged position, completely at ease now that he was sure she hadn't hurt herself. "I am sorry, I forgot you would be getting used to your enhanced senses." Eyes a lively lilac rimmed with a deeper, darker violet, he watched as she tentatively sniffed the food once again and expertly hid a smile of amusement when she drew quickly away again to sneeze. "I promise, it will not shock you so in a few hours. Just be glad you are a woman. It is much worse for males."

But she didn't seem too terribly troubled about that. She was peering down at the bowl with a wary hesitation, her eyes slightly narrowed, lips pursed as she examined the golden contents. Perhaps even she didn't know what she was concerned about, but instantly he understood upon a glance toward the puzzled, genially uncertain set of her face. It might have seemed a little oxymoronical for an immortal to be worried about poison in their food, but it was actually quite a savvy thing to do in a place both unfamiliar and threatening. There were drugs that might not have killed whoever ingested it due to the comfortable safety net of unending life, but they could strike the soul body so hard with pain and unnatural sickness that death might have been relieving. Instinct was what drove her now; instinct that was very aware of the power and influence she didn't have.

"No one had the chance to do anything to it. Nisroc would never dare with both Pandora _and_ myself to watch her hands."

"Pandora?" Lilith looked up at him with a tiny jerk of recognition upon hearing a name she was familiar with. "As in—"

"—the box, yes." He laughed gently, kicking off his boots to could situate himself more comfortably, drawing his feet up to sprawl in a half-prone lounge across the foot of the plush, spacious bed. "But more accurately, the guardian of the mortal put in charge of the box. That, however, is a story for another day," he told her, lip curving fondly in reply to the scowl she shot him. "You need to eat that and build up your strength so I can take you home."

She was confused and her puzzled green eyes did nothing to hide that while she cocked her head to one side. "Home?" What did he mean? She had been under the impression that she would be living solely in hell from then on. Hadn't that been the price for stolen immortality; a forever in false damnation?

Azrael seemed to have followed her train of thought. "I have a certain amount of authority here which allows me a bit of leeway, and I am not keeping you locked up here away from your friends." His eyes were a crystal lilac, soft and moderate, full of a feeling that probably couldn't be comprehended by anyone with less knowledge of his history. It was said with a kind of weight that said very clearly that he had experienced just what he was talking about. "That is what gives you _life_ in place of plain existence. I have neither the will nor the desire to keep you chained here when I could give you freedom. In any case, as soon as you are fit again, I will escort you back home." A hand lifted from where it rested against the mattress, one snowy-white index finger pointing severely to the bowl she held. "Now, eat!"

Compliant with the gnaw of her hunger, she spooned some of the porridge into her mouth at his request. When she coughed due to the punch of near-violent flavor to her sense of taste, Azrael simply laughed, his musical voice lilting in the song of bell-like beauty while he flopped flat onto his back to regale the air with his joy. Joy that she was well...joy that she was his.

* * *

Much different from what a common blacksmith's workshop would look like even to the uneducated eye, the minute arena of forges under the direction and use of the heaven's metal smiths were situated along the border which stretched between the nether and the forested half-realm that sprawled out alongside it. Like a branching limb from a spectral body, the woods started out as a thin grassy sweep of green before ascending in height to tower with the thick barrier of trees and foliage of which it was made. A paradise in more than just name. Normally the borderland was an airy space, the air over which was sweet with the smell of growth and spicy from the taint of the ornamental kitchens that lay just a half-league from the smithy. Today however, for the first time in mortal centuries, the forge fires were lit with a driven purpose.

Instead of the usual two, there was a total of four blazes contained within the heavy rock ovens.

The heat from the magical fires shimmered upon the air, causing liquid shadows to ripple across the ground and thick clouds of slate gray star-soot to powder upon any flat surface it could find. Amiriel found herself cursing when the sneeze seemed to tear out a good portion of her sinus tract, and quickly exhaled to clear the passage before ducking under the mesh and leather flaps hanging from the eaves to enter the boiling sanctuary her master was busy managing. She handled the bunch of freshly fletched arrows with the steady hand of one accustomed to dealing with weaponry, and set the bundle down on an unoccupied table – the one she had wisely claimed with use of the empty quiver that morning. Pulling on her gloves with a flex of fingers to adjust her skin to the heavy leather, she strode across the soot-streaked floor to approach the man bent over the largest of the lit forges and waiting for him to reach a place where she could interrupt without causing damage to whatever he was working on.

Sparks hissed and spat like an angry wildcat under the blade being heated and shaped under the man's hand, indifferent to the love and tenderness he put into his work and the songs he whispered to the fire in order to appease it. Hephaestus was a exceedingly patient, even for an angel, and his steady, agile hands might have been callused, but he treated his blades with the touch of a lover. The muscles in his naked shoulders and arms bunched when he shifted to draw the project from the heated womb of the forge and he backed up, guiding the eerily gleaming red mass of metal to the nearest table and setting it down.

He muttered a quick spell to keep the metal at its current temperature and shape before regarding his disciple with a ready blue eye. "Yes?"

Amiriel grabbed one of the clean towels from the hamper stowed at the table's foot and tossed it to her master. He took it gratefully and wiped the sweat and soot from his face and neck underneath the barb-wire choker circling it. She had never seen him without the leather jerkin, so it was a little startling to watch him pull down the zipper and shrug the garment down from muscular shoulders and arms to rid his chest of a slough of perspiration as well, and inquired slowly, "Sir...?"

"I forgot how fussy this lady is," he indicated the metal he was working on with a hand gloved up to the elbow in a leather gauntlet. "She doesn't like my touch after so many years."

She glanced at it and suddenly felt the frown cross her lips as recognition hit her with a jolt. "That's Azrael's scythe," she said softly, and looked back up to confirm with the nod given with Hephaestus' pale silver-blond head, the soot-black streaks in the bangs slicked to his forehead by dampness.

"Danue, yes. She had a few scratches and was faring ill on the under edge."

The pause lasted for a little longer than was comfortable for either of them. Filled with a mixture of reminiscence and sour memory, Amiriel glanced backward toward the other three forges and the bustle of six other disciples back and forth among them; checking heat, adjusting temperature, administering soot, gauging weights and measuring blade edges. "What else?"

Hephaestus rested the palm of one hand against the thick edge of the rock-sturdy table, tables that would survive anything form scorching to scoring with tools, and took inventory while pointing. "Sariel's glaive there, brought in for a retreatment on the finish but I found a few other problems to fix. And Gabriel's ordered a set of bracers from us to replace the ones Abaddon melted."

"During the Ides of March," she murmured, "I remember." She turned back to him with a grim look, her face striped with the violently pink mohawk tail of her hair. "Uriel sent us arrows to fortify, two-hundred count, all of them pre-spelled for immediate treatment."

"Hm..." was the noncommittal noise her master made in response as he reached for his hammer and adjusted the lay of the scythe-blade upon the anvil surface. "You'll want viper's gold for those, just use enough to coat each tip before you press them, then use the standard water-bless. He can do the rest himself."

The expression on her face was alarmed. She had never been allowed to work on one of the archangels' commissions before, and being told specifically to do so had caught her off-guard. "Sir?"

With a small thin-lipped smile, Hephaestus jerked his clean-shaven chin with a throaty chuckle, "has all this banging made you deaf, girl?" Then he sobered and encouraged her softly, "you've been ready, there just wasn't a need. Now I've got orders up to my ears and I need all the help I can get. You've the best hands in here besides mine to deal with picky shit like the kind Uriel wants." Tapping the head of the sturdy hammer against the hot silver of the scythe, he explained, "this one's just a little more than the usual picky. It'll keep you on your toes, but tough it out and do it, you'll be fine."

Amiriel swallowed the lump blocked in her throat before giving him a jerky nod. "Yes, Sir," she mumbled, and went in search of the proper mold for arrow-tips befitting the bolts a longbow, barely any attention to be spared for the waves from the other disciples she passed.

Four forges, three of which were occupied by commissions from the seraphim. She could remember only two other occasions in which this had occurred, and neither of them had deescalated into anything pleasant. She didn't need the bitter tang of metal on the air or the taste of soot, or even the hard banging of her master' infamous hammer stroke to tell her that tension was in the wind. Tension masquerading its true name and nature under the grudging claim of uncertainty. Tension which was better known as the prequel to war.

It had been a long time, and while most of this prelude was nothing more solid than rumor and happenstance, if the seraphim were getting antsy enough to be freshening up their armor and weaponry supply...there could be better signs.

"Water!"

The shout cued the youngest of her fellows into streaking toward their master with a pitcher which sloshed with the demanded element to assist Hephaestus in guiding the scythe's problematic metal to shape properly, and she watched the terrified, pick-cheeked cherub pour upon instruction. A hint of weariness plagued her mood, almost sullen under the pressure of the underlying threat to all the activity. The last thing anyone wanted was another drawn-out conflict. So she offered a quick prayer, briefly making a pair of signs to flesh out the hopeful plea, then resigned herself to the task of fortifying the spells on the dark archangel's arrows. A task she had once watched her master perform with a skill and grace she had envied and coveted since she had been a child, since she had been old enough to appreciate the symphony of hammer to metal and the smell of smoke, and would now be undertaking herself.

_Mother, will we come through without blood feud?_

_...so let it be._

* * *

**...ok, so I lied. **

**I finished my hellish (harhar) paper for Anthropology today and felt the need to celebrate. So I pushed my butt into motion and finished up this wee little filler chapter for you lovely, awesome, amazing, beautiful, spectacular readers. The last scene wasn't originally part of it, but after a bit of a grudging epiphany, I decided I wanted to put something in that varied from the hinting tidbits I've giving up until now. Also, for someone's suggestion that we hadn't met many of the angels yet. **

**My heaven is...strange. That's all I'm going to say on that matter for now.**

**I also got a freakin' epic splurge of inspiration from seeing 'Angels and Demons' yesterday...to the point where I wanted to pee myself I was so excited with the scene ideas. Sadly, those probably won't be read until we get to probably volume 4. Lamesauce, I know....I'm sorry! -cries-**

**Tralala...what else was I going to say? I can't remember...**

**OH, yes! The scarily-detailed clothings. I have a ridiculously horrid habit of describing mundane things like physical appearance with way too much detail than they deserve...repeatedly. This is nothing new. Also, costume designing is yet another hobby of mine (one of many), and I've actually drawn up sketches for several of the outfits I've mentioned before. Among others to come, and many that won't ever be described...we hope...**

**Alrighty, methinks that's about all I've got for you for today. The next chapter's already finished, and it's a recent one too so it shouldn't take me long to run over it one more time. Look for that one soon!**

**Pretty please review for me?? Thank you very much!**

**See you next time!! **

**:D**


	40. For Whom the Bell Tolls

**Chapter 58: For Whom the Bell Tolls**

Recommended Listening: "The King" by Harry Gregson-Williams [from Kingdom of Heaven]

* * *

Salt floated through the smoke-thickened air, tiny iridescent particles to catch and filter the light streaming outward from the non-flickering oil lamp lit with orange. It powdered the surfaces of tables, work benches, bookshelves, and floor; dusted the glass vials of plant essences and natural supplements, the ceramic dishes laden with chemicals and salves; and coated the fingers of all three angels while they surveyed the catalogued results of their many laborious tests with grim shadows spread across their fine faces. Six separate copies of the modified records scroll lay spread before them, each isolated individually by screens of melded power – a sheer white that shimmered with sparks alternating in soft green and violet hues. Across another of the wide, spacious tables were page after page of parchment, an ordered, messy spill of papers lines and scrawled with documentation of every procedure yet attempted.

Yet for all the experiments they had tried, every spell and ritual performed, every modification that seemed even remotely related or sensible, no solution had presented itself. Over and over they had wiped the slates, redistributing finishing spells to recreate the original manipulated state of the scroll, and applied new combinations of magic; from the natural to the alchemic to sheer, brute energy. Still, after all the effort, dry as a desert-bleached bone.

This last series had been their final spur of ideas, a torrid meld of natural salves combined with a frankly crudely unmeasured thrust of magic to split the spells down the center, cracking away the layers in the attempt to force them to open and reveal their secrets. It had been a desperate attempt and each of them knew it. Truth spells with a base in force were often used in the place of torture for interrogation, not for solving puzzles…yet what choice had they had? While it had been a foolish hope – and proven false, not to mention stinking the entire room with the spices mixed with tallow and salt-powder (unpleasant to delicate noses, to say the least) – it had, if nothing else, checked off another possibility on a long and tedious list.

Leaning heavily on both palms to evenly distribute his weight, Ezekiel let a soft sigh slip from his mouth. "There _has_ to be a way…" he pursed his lips and glowered down at the nearest copy-scroll, still unresponsive to the last spell, though it was glowing with a quiet glare of red, as if it was echoing pain from the stripping magic.

"But what?" In his own right, normally patient, steady Cassiel wore an expression distinctly reminiscent of a dour, devoutly strict priest crossed with a drill sergeant to darken his chocolate brow. Displeased and not really caring whether he showed it or not, he rubbed a clean towel along the thick length of his arm to wipe it clean of the sloughing salt-powder and ginger salve. "Four days and still nothing. I've half a mind to blast the damn record to Oblivion—no disrespect, sir."

His general merely responded with a half-hearted shrug, his academic mind far from the mention of the old military nickname being used in vain. Yet unlike his green-eyed lieutenant, his focus was on the original document, not the copies, locked away safe under a shield of orange fire that ran slick and slippery with glimmers of yellow highlights like spilled petrol. The eyes that stared out from kohl-lined sockets were intent, dark, furrowed, but also set with a hard, sudden flicker of determination. "Cassiel…"

"Sir?"

"Fetch me a dose of nightshade, will you?"

Ezekiel looked up with bewildered eyes. "Whatever for?" he choked, surprised and a little worried. Nightshade after using so much power already? Sure, it was an enhancer, but, still…

The seraph rolled his sleeve up to the bend above his elbow, clearing the way to the brachial artery that pulsed under the soft, tender inside to the joint. "I'm going to try to see."

"Scrying in the past? I thought you already saw—"

"I might have missed something. There is a slight chance that it has more to offer if I pry far enough," Azrael flexed his fingers and nodded to Cassiel, waiting for confirmation, the dark angel swallowing his halfhearted protest in favor of gathering both the herbal dose and the needle to inject it. "Besides that—I don't know what else to try, not unless I get a better look, if there is one."

"What if there isn't?" Lime-forest eyes peered beseechingly over at their commander and mentor, roan hair streaked with perspiration scented of a forest glen after a heavy rain to soak the soft, silky hawk feathers that drew russet, red-brown patterns down the line of his bare neck. There was no mistaking the concern in his expression, both for the sake of his leader's health and for the sake of the mission, and its implied importance for the sheer mystery of it.

Yet Azrael's response was a mild slip of sound to state softly, "then we try something else," and the other angel knew to hold his tongue. The tourniquet fit snug and tight around his forearm, below the brachial artery and pulled taut by his free hand, turning the limb toward his first lieutenant, whose dark fingers were finishing up the preparations for the injection, nail clicking gently against the needle that ran slick with the liquefied supplement. Cassiel lifted his head; the half-tail of many tiny braids swishing across the tops of his shoulders while he took a step toward the general, instrument extended, and gripped the proffered wrist with a large, solid-boned hand.

The needle's sharpened point sank deep into the muscle under the space at the inside of his elbow, a sharp slide of pain that dulled to a slow, melting kind of throb while the essence of belladonna, deadly nightshade in a common garden, being forcibly shoved into his body. It was carried quickly by the bloodstream and absorbed into chakra that flowed down his extended arms to pool into the shielded document spread across the counter, the drug inflaming and warping, boosting his strengths with highlights and reinforcement. He gathered the magic in his palms, gripping for concentration and focus under the sway of the toxin's clutches, and poured his power into the original scroll. Instead of pulling the layers apart like tissue paper, he reached and observes, searching with an open mind to receive whatever message was being concealed – the missing link to the puzzle set out before them

It burned harsh and livid, a scalding ache, but for some reason its scalding presence always seemed to energize, at least long enough to give the user an abundance of energy. In fact, as he felt Cassiel remove the tourniquet and step back a few feet, giving him the space to perform whatever spells he needed for the venture, he noted that his senses seemed to have sharpened, narrowed and alert, almost as if he were…going to fight.

This time when the vision hit, he was ready for it. With the predetermined hope that something useful would come out of this attempt, he dove into the snippet of the past with the determination to notice, receive, and understand what the Sight presented. It enveloped him like a pool of liquid, swallowing the real world to bury his mind and senses in the living, breathing fragment of memory. As with the first vision, he saw it as an outsider, bodiless eyes and ears and mind to interpret the dry, parched land that so many people revered, and all for this specific event as well; the crucifixion of the false Christ, the very foundation of Christian faith spurred by the intentional indirect suicide by a Jew.

* * *

— **c.28 A.D.; Jerusalem —**

Hot and dry, the air parched his throat and lungs with each breath taken, rough and uneven as the gasps that bled sand into the lining of his lips and pain into his chest with the dire, straining exertion of the dying. The scene was so like a typical crucifixion; the mob and the guards, the giant cross being towed with toil up the hill to the execution site, yet so much was it different. There was not near so much verbal scorn for the heretic, the betrayer to the Roman way. Instead there was silence such as he wasn't sure he had ever known before…silence lit only with the murmur of hidden sobs and the reeking stink of terror.

He could barely watch anymore, knowing that it was by his mouth that this had come about, no matter what the man had said to him in private, begging him to do the deed no one should have even considered for the sin of it. The figure that slipped, bare, scraped feet scrabbling at the rocky earth, tipping dangerously under the burden laden across his shoulders to gain back his balance – the strike with the whip to make him move, as if he had lingered just a few seconds too long for the bronze-armored guard's anxious tastes. As if he could feel the grunting, grimacing effort it took from an already suffering body, his muscles shrieked with pain as he got to his feet, standing from the crouch, eyes tightly shut against the tears that stung at the corners of his eyes and the silence that pressed down upon him like the weight of a thousand curses.

Curses that would never rest.

Not until the ending of the earth.

Then they were there, appearing from a mist of space and time to settle upon the crest of the opposing hilltop, and somehow he could see them – the angels – bright and fair, so beautiful that it pained the eyes to look upon them. They sat astride horses, like the wealthy Romans did, but unlike the smug, victory-drunken persecutors, their mounts were not the slaving, weary beasts that did the will of tiresome, often cruel masters, but alert and clear-eyed and knowing as the burdened, earthen horses were not. With shining manes and flicking, glorious tails, they whickered and shifted, the light playing on their gleaming coats and casting brilliant shimmers throughout the sky above them. And still, it was nothing to the glory of their riders, a glory that had no words or pictures to accurately put description to them. Yet unlike the giddy squalor of malicious glee emanating from the human men, the holy creatures' glow was cold.

Their displeasure beat at him like a ravenous hunger, crushing like a weight woven purely of raw chastisement while they watched the Christ bleed upon the cross, their beautiful, peerless faces somber just as they were pitiless. _Porcelain,_ he thought, _like porcelain from Persia. _There were four of them, four strange, beautiful figures, male (though it seemed odd that he could tell), with great, sweeping wings grown through their shoulders. Wings which draped down the horses' flanks to mark them clearly as the sheer pulsing power of them might not have to the naïve or unperceptive. Two were pale and clear like stars, alien for their strange coloring, two darker and stern, with a more familiar cut to their features.

Yet for their similarity, the angelic glow, the brilliance, the hum of their strength – not displayed, not flaunted – upon the air, they were each one an individual. The expressions in their lovely faces ranged from explicit rage to downright pity.

"He has failed, then," it was the white one that spoke, the one whose face melded smooth and unreal from ancient to youthful as if by some illusion of matter, his half-bound sheet of hair like strands of pure, cloudy pearl across garments apparently woven of silver. "I hoped this wouldn't be the case."

The darkest spoke then, his answer a deep, belling tone much lower than the first's piercing sweetness, as if echoing from the depths of the night. "So we all hoped." He adjusted his posture astride the great grey horse that bore him, touching an empty palm, strong and sure to his mount's neck to calm its restless shifting. His eyes strayed, two black, empty voids of unending darkness, to focus on the angel to his very left, fine face tilted as if in question – a light, tingling inquiry that went unspoken, yet somehow he could hear it as if it was, a brushing touch to the mind.

_Does the boy know he will leave this world for hell's gates?_

The beat of his heart streaked, faster and faster, fast enough that he could have been sprinting. Adrenaline soared through his veins as he stared, watching with wide, stunned, comprehending eyes while the angel with the hair the color of sunshine lifted his face to gaze down at the cross erected under the noonday light that baked the winding, rocky trail of the Via Dolorosa. Jeweled irises swept down across at the shadow carved into the ground speckled with blood, at the body hung in the uncomfortable arch that brought and served a punishment fit for no goodhearted spirit, and betrayed not even a hint of emotion. The eyes that looked out from that strange, ethereal countenance were as unfeeling as the earthen stone beneath his pale horse's hooves. Pale as burnt cream…

"Knowledge is not a gift I bestow upon the ears of traitors."

A voice so glorious it could charm the curses from the lips of the soothsayers, a voice that could entreat even the greediest, piggish, gloating man to his end with joy and willingness, and it came from a throat that showed no emotion. Not even when his sights slid from one bleeding, suffering body down, sweeping with a slow, pointed ease to the crowd that had gathered to stare, aghast and afeared, up at the slowly dying figure of Christ. Then those merciless eyes swept to the side, a sleek turn of a golden head, hair bound in a gather of pale morning, eyes the color of newly-chipped amethyst boring right into him. That one look was all it took to freeze his heart solid inside the cavity of his chest, welding it right to ribs that could have shattered under the sheer forcible impact from meeting the eyes of an angel.

With a rainfall of silver hammered to coin-shape, the chilled glitter of man-crafted metal upon the dry, cracked earth, he turned tail and fled the scene – the result of his betrayal. Loving neither the money nor the gratitude from higher mortal powers, and finding no peace upon the notion that he had done his messiah's will to send God's supposed message, he fled upon feet that bleed black with shame until he could no longer feel the overbearing power of divinity digging into his back. He ran until he came to the tree, gripping its sparse, gnarled boughs with hands that trembled, hardly able to see for the tears that dripped down his cheeks.

The rough bark frayed and powdered beneath his touch, a shedding of skin in the heat of spring, the scentless berries oddly cool to the skin at the back of his hand, disguising the potent juice and seed the little fruits held within. He leaned against the trunk, the great, twisting pillar of wood that overlooked the shepherds' fields, dappled with a scattering of dry, coarse grass which the mangy animals plucked at with seeking lips, oblivious to the man that watched them so enviously. Innocent creatures, not knowing the plague of mankind that would supposedly be erased with the blood spilt on this horror of days, all sins to be forgotten for the sake of one soul's pain. Every sin but one.

When he pulled the belt of rope from his waist, fumbling blindly with the knot that looped around the base of one of the higher limbs, slipping only slightly on the bough that held his weight, he was filled with a kind of sorrow that seemed to ache for the deep, singing hopelessness that stung him like a barb. Knowing that not even by this end could he undo the horrible wrong he had done…it was almost unbearable. Yet he could think of no other way, not when the realization that for the rest of time his name would be painted alongside the words of traitor, backstabber, sinner – he didn't know how he could live with it. How could he, knowing that he would be remembered only for his folly in following a path of death and destruction adjacent to God's search for goodness? It was his friend and mentor's face, his teacher, his Christ's face that he saw, reflected both in pleading and in placated pain behind his eyelids when he slipped the noose around his neck and stepped off the branch to his impending end. Betrayer, faithful in his hopes until the snap of his neck shut out everything but that same accursed silence.

Still it rang with the murmur of shapeless voices that only true silence has, enough to madden when the mind begins to understand that there is no such thing as quiet. Nothing but darkness to chill the spirit and cold to bite at a body that no longer existed; already seized with breathless stillness, empty, a deserted husk, a corpse left swinging in the dry breeze he had left because he knew it wanted nothing but to shun him. If he had hands to fist, they did, eyes to seal tightly shut, they did, trying to squeeze out the numbing of the cold and the maddening mutter of the white noise that drilled tiny holes into his formless, nonexistent skull.

Was this hell? He didn't know. Nothing in Christ's teachings had described the place for sinners and soul-soiled demons. But it must have been, for he was soiled enough to fit right in at the center of the deepest pits of stinking, rotting filth. So why wasn't he being punished; if not simply for his crime, then for his self-condemnation? And why…did that noise now sound like the faint, muted rush of a quiet river?

"Hung yourself from a Juniper tree, Judas?"

A light, soft, vague, only a shadow of shading gray to quench the blackness, before it blossomed into the violet-tinged night that permeated the dark to give it breath and life, and gave him the sense of structure and shape to notice that he still retained some kind of body. The sensations were fragmented, sloppy, as if he had been shoved inside a new vessel to carry his soul in the afterlife, and he was relearning how to use it. His eyes were still fuzzy, but when he was able to focus, see the misty night that seemed to surround him, limitless and boundless space shrouded by the calming closeness of the frost-laden fog, he could sense no more than a place he had never been before. A place older than he knew how to either reconcile or count, lit by a presence that seemed lightly familiar, but different, as though the weight of it had shifted and eased.

"Original, I give you that, but unnecessary."

He turned, how, he wasn't quite sure, and lifted his eyes to the face that had stared so frigidly down at him from on high, the golden sheen of divinity still clinging to the firm structure of a body that seemed so much more real here. Soft, silken feathers draped the wings that were folded neat against the angel's back, as soft as the piercing eyes that settled on his awed, reverent expression, a glow of silver to remind him of the price paid for foolishness.

The angel's smile, so smooth and kind that it struck him numb with love for the beauty of it, was a surprise, certainly not the retributive vengeance for the betrayal of Christ he had expected. And the hands that cupped his up-tipped chin were cold in the way of living marble – chilled, but no longer icy and without feeling. The eyes he had seen as empty and soulless were so warm now, he could do nothing but stare into them, gaping, overwhelmed by the press of the divine, now gentle for the lack of the weight belonging to tempestuous scorn. "You needn't fear me, Iscariot's son," the angel murmured, and it was a soothing sound to ease the tremors that quailed inside a coward's heart. "I'll not harm you. Nor have I any punishment to mete to you, unless you deem an eternity in heaven's arms to be a curse?"

"I…what?" A peal of quiet laughter rang, and it came just as he realized that he was looking into the eyes of death himself, the black angel who…was neither dark nor ugly as most thought would befit such a cruel being. Judas felt his ethereal body slacken and relax, almost at its own will, or that of the angel before him, and saw, for the first time, the light that had evaded him for so long. "I committed no sin?"

"No, child," Death's voice came warm and honeyed again, and he let it flow over the kneeling human's soul-form like a mix between liquor and salve. "You are no sinner, but the sufferer and witness to one." Something in those endless eyes shifted, softened to a touch of pity, feeling that gave the angel's face a sorrowed-sweet edge. "They will hate you, despise you, use you for a scapegoat to blame for the evils left in their world, speak your name with likening to that of serpents and poison, but they are erred and human. It will not be the first time they turn their fickle hearts to a false idol and turn from whom they should truly follow."

Every word stung; _hate, despise, blame_…needles to bury deep inside flesh, puncturing the vitals and organs beneath their disease-ridden points. Despite the pillowed press of them, the feathery softness with which they were spoken, Judas could feel himself wince beneath the impact, hanging his head as though too ashamed of allowing what had happened to pass. Though he understood now, that Jesus' intentions through the haphazard suicidal feigned betrayal to the Romans, his great goal of dying to erase the sins of the earth, was nothing but inspired insanity; some part of him still felt guilty at having allowed it without complaint. None of the disciples had ever questioned the messiah…perhaps he should have. If one of them had argued, even once made the remark that perhaps this wasn't the will of God, perhaps things would have been different. "It's my fault," he muttered, voice thick and hard at the back of dry throat.

"Shh," the angel touched the tips of two fingers to his mouth, bidding him to hush, and he looked up into Death's face once more, and saw that it had gentled once again, far from the alabaster cruelty of the elemental that had looked upon the dying Christ with resentment and cold, callous slight in jeweled eyes. "The favor of the Creator is not so fleeting or so stern. You were always a pious soul—good and true and just as many men fail to become. You were the guardian of things most would give their lives to see for a moment's breadth, charged by forces higher than you suspected…higher far than the power you so blindly accepted for a child born of holy blood."

Death gave him a look that seemed to mirror nothing but understanding, a source of empathy that reached beneath the human's skin to bolster the reinforcement of calm that soothed Judas' soul. "We have never turned from you," came that voice again, lovely and steady and just the tiniest slice of longing to make the edges rough.

Fine white features glowing, feathery wings arcing, stretching regal and strong behind a straight back, the angel gave him a kindly smile and bid him to rise with the curve of a hand. He obeyed as if pulled by strings like a children's marionette. "Now come, walk with me." Fine fingers gripped him gently by the shoulder, the grasp steady to steer him toward the right.

It was then that the rushing noise and its source became clear as the slow, ebbing flow of water seemed to weave and softly twine like a living thing over and about his feet. The river of the Underworld, its path and province, had a melting warmth to its shallow depth that seemed to push a renewed energy and strength into his newfangled body as he walked with the angel's hand a comforting lead at his shoulder, guiding him onward into his next life. And it was a bright, clean, brilliant light to illuminate, almost sadly, the dark solace of Death's pathway.

Like a breath of clean, new air, heaven's grace bathed the new human soul in the embrace of parenthood, loving and joyous and gentle, a new life to carry the wake of the old and soon to be forgotten. Never again would Judas hear the brand of traitor sear his unguarded heart, for the touch of divinity from the smile of its mother and nurturer washed away the fear and the pain of it, replacing the worn, wearied despair with its twin and opposite – hope, and the knowledge that his suffering for the sake of the false messiah would not go without reward. _Welcome, Judas,_ the cloud-wrapped jewel of a world seemed to greet him with the warmth of a tender touch to his face, _welcome and know your purpose._ Because this man's task was not yet complete, yet he looked upon it with the awe and joy of the uplifted nonetheless.

The dark, still netherwhere that was the Underworld faded behind the turned mortal back. He never once noticed, not even when the light pressure of the angel's hand slipped away, guiding complete, task finished, the fair face vanishing as if one with the half-realm of peace and rebirth, the road that stretched between real and unreal, pain and pleasure, until the two placed were separate once again. The blackness closed around the angel as the whiteness closed around the human, and the air turned ripe, sharp and bitter with the tang of Juniper that coated the immortal fingers that rose to bid the gate guardian of the holy realm a silent greeting. Sharp and bitter, faint, a remembered scent in this context, absent of the charred, crackling smell of burning cinders.

The glass-clear wall between them lie painted with the bowled symbol of the chalice. A sweet, pungent V, the substance singing into memory with the violet flame that burned as a seal to lock the door between eternal life and the sleep of death.

Juniper for strength and longevity. Juniper for fertility. Juniper for foresight.

_Juniper…_

* * *

— **Present Time —**

Violet chips of starry ice slid sharply from unseeing and blank to alert, awakened, oriented to his real-time surroundings with the knowing of normal consciousness. The only slack was in the obvious affect of the drug still fizzing through his magical veins, Chakra hissing like a tame fire quartered inside his body, parallel to the blood in the arteries lying beside them – shown in the dilated state of ink-dark pupils that lifted just slightly to the waiting, watching lieutenants. "That's it—" he choked, coughing lightly under the influence of a lingering scent. "The link…Juniper."

Ezekiel shared a glance with Cassiel, the two angels exchanging mutual flares of confusion. "Juniper? The plant?" Crossing the room to the stores of herbal essences and extracts, the roan-haired male reached up and took hold of a small ceramic jar of a potent salve created from the crushed berries of the tough, bitter, flexible plant that shared the name his general kept whispering. He peered down at it, baffled, and dipped his head to sniff delicately at the slick greenish paste, quickly drawing back when the sharpness of the smell clouded his senses like a solid. "Fertility and gin? What the hell does _this_ have to do with anything?"

The room was beating like a heart, light and dark, light and dark again, flaring in and out of focus like an illusion lit with the sparks of small green and orange flames. His eyelids were heavy, a warm, hazy muddle of sound and silence muffling the weight of his tongue to speak. "I don't know…"

When Azrael's body gave way, it was Cassiel who caught him before he collapsed to the ground under the mixed influences of exhaustion and a drug-induced stupor. It wasn't strange for nightshade to have this affect, after all Azrael had taken a concentrated dose, and a good-sized one at that. The substance had knocked him into unconsciousness, the potency and the weariness, not to mention the burden of whatever else was pressing down on his shoulders. Yet both lieutenants showed sympathy within the second brief glance they shared before the chocolate-skinned guardian shifted the seraph's weight to carry the virtually-inebriated Azrael back to his rooms without complaint.

Many in heaven would have done the same for the _Manal_ Infantry general. There were those who owed his generous nature more than could be imagined, and those who would far rather have served under his kinder, more lenient and understanding hand but lacked the freedom to do so. Azrael was something of a tragic hero among the youth of his species, which was a revelry left in secrecy and closed off from the angel of death's notice. But his ignorance to the awed form of respect did not dissuade the simple fact that he did all he could to counteract the negative connotation often perceived by his assortment of titles and duties.

He'd had every right to be cold and distant, even downright cruel. He had never been anything but controlled, empathetic and gentle. Such an attitude had earned him many allies. All of them willing, determined even, to aide and assist him. Of course, there were some things no one could help him with.

So much energy had already been poured into this project, yet the so-called solution had only inspired more questions rather than answers. Personally, Cassiel hoped that his general wouldn't have to drown himself into study and work again for a good, long while. The seraph needed rest and recuperation, a time to heal, not to fret himself into more knots. He needed to spend a few weeks locked away with that sweet little ward of his, doing nothing more serious than gifting the girl with a good full-body, spiritual baptism.

But if even Azrael didn't know right off the bat what the importance of his findings were, weariness not withstanding, such a break wasn't likely to appear. Not with impending threat lining the horizon. Not until a solution presented itself.

And time was not a lenient master.

* * *

**Told you I'd be faster this time!**

**:D**

**Well now...we know why the records are called what they are now...sort of. More on that later, it's an ongoing developmental plot-strand. The historical flashback in this chapter might seem more relevant than the one in the previous chapter, but the truth is they're both involved, it'll just take us a while to discover exactly why. I've been asked a few times, so I suppose now's as good a time as any to answer; if this story includes me doing a lot of research. **

**Truthfully, the amount of research I do is rather limited, most of what I do is interested browsing of information because religious systems amaze and fascinate me. I am not of any organized religious faith but I am a highly spiritual person, I happened to choose Christianity because it's one of the widest-spread systems, one of the oldest, and also the one I am most familiar with. Also because I take a sadistic pleasure in turning it on its head, which is much of what I'm doing here. The core characters I derived actually while looking through a pack of tarot cards I own (the "Winged Spirit" deck, I believe) and whereupon I fell in love with Azrael's name (Death or XIII in the deck) and the description of the card in fit with the characterization. From that point on I just started browsing around and then one random day the story was born. I was already somewhat familiar with angelic and gospel lore, so now mostly I feed off what I know with what I have reshaped to fuel my muse and inner romantic to write this story. **

**I am not particularly true to much of the bible or historical truth, but I do try to make it at least somewhat believable, even if just a smidgeon. It's easy for me to lose myself in magic and myth, but not as much so for others, so I do try. Some things I deliberately leave solid fact, such as this chapter's depiction of the location of Jesus' crucifixion and some of the more known qualities of the Juniper plant and berries...which was a random selection, by the way, and no, burning Juniper leaves will not grant you foresight. That's me twisting things for my race of angels. That in itself is part of my search for realizing christianity and the believability of my story. While parts are most certainly romanticisized BS (Disney girl at heart, my apologies), the fact that I ultimately depict my angels and my personification of God as imperfect is a slip of my personal beliefs and of simply reality that perfection is a mindset and an opinion. But ultimately, underlying everything I've just explained, my purpose is just to be creative. I just happen to have a medium that uses a widespread belief-system as my paint and charcoal. :) everything else just flows as it wants to. I'm just happy people are enjoying it.**

**To answer more simply; no, I don't do a terrible lot of researching for MH.**

....

**So, I'm faintly amused that Beelzebub's getting so much love and affection from the readers. Though I'm sorry (and bemused) to say the exclusive rights to him have belonged to my beta since the first scene I every wrote for him...and very nearly the first line he speaks...I report that he enjoys and relishes the attention. And he'll be seen fairly often enough, scattered throughout the series, seeing as how he's Azrael's closest friend and one of Lilith's confidants. -gigglesnort- It just amuses me that he's so popular, but I understand why. **

**Also a brief apology for the confusion some might have had over the last scene of the last chapter, it was a convoluted hinting and a subtle trick to emphasize that the overall situation's getting a bit tense. I just did it to introduce some more anxiety on heaven's end versus the anxiety we already know is going on in hell. So, sorry and thank you for sticking with me and my crazy mass of characters!  
**

**And I think that about wraps it up for this installment...I do not know when I'll get the next one up, so bear with me and I'll try to write it as fast as I can.**

**...**

**Please, please take the time to review! Remember I love you, and see you next time! **


	41. Plumeria

**Chapter 59: Plumeria**

Recommended Listening: "Carry Your Cross" by Tiamat

* * *

Encased deep within the gloomy dusk which filled the room a pair of eyes slid slowly open. Darkness like heavy liquid that seemed to move and breathe all on its own – some coiling, writhing living thing lit with a snap of that ruby flame. Irises pierced the dark with the potent sharpness of a knife, livid crimson rings that burned, dark and flaming, around pupils that filled out from narrow black slits to the full round shape of a human's. But the owner of these eyes was no more human than the stars of the nether were. He stared, unblinking, unseeing, at the fine decor, the rich draperies swathing the spacious chamber, gaze focused on something only he could see. As though frozen in place, a graceful statue of cold and marble, the chill that emanated from his form frosted the air about him like an aura of tiny, iridescent ice crystals, seemingly oblivious to the two others in the room with him.

The company he kept voiced neither surprise nor complaint toward being temporarily ignored. Both soldiers remained positively motionless where they knelt, their honed, trained bodies still and quiet while they awaited the attention having been summoned would eventually cast upon them. But until they were spoken to, there would be no speech, no movement, no nothing. That was the extent to which they served. Not out of a direct order, but out of healthy, fearful respect for the master who held their leashes.

"Nergal, my precious," the female that crouched at his feet shifted, the tiniest lift of her head to acknowledge her master's lush, silken voice. Finally being invited into motion by the call from a far superior power. "What is the status of your Ghosts?"

Uncoiling, bestial and sleek, from her crouch, she lifted eyes deep as a midnight sky to gather the silent, still-given command lining the tone of those spoken words. The long, shining black hair that slipped in snaky tendrils along naked feminine shoulders veiled a fierce face full of driven, knowing purpose. "Ready and waiting, Majesty," she answered obediently with a dutiful incline of her chin.

Secondary in receiving acknowledgement of his own, the other soldier in the room wisely hid the tension that rippled along the back of his neck under the touch of their master's eyes. He adjusted position to ease it, disguising it as an excuse to move closer to the seated king's feet and crouching there as his commander did with a smooth, sleek slide of thinly-fitted leather. "We merely require orders, Your Infernal Majesty."

One lovely male hand descended from the armrest of the carven throne to stroke the female's dark head, fingers ruffling amid thick, luxurious wolf fur that spread to blanket the crackling shift of tendon and bone, silky pointed ears lying flat with subservient pleasure in the touch. He did not speak right away, merely stroked the black fur with long, elegant white hands. "I have reason to believe the new hybrid was removed from our realm without formal clearance," the voice mused, lowering porcelain lids back down to cover scarlet eyes. "A direct offense against my rule, which heaven knows is akin to grievous insult."

Nergal's wolfish head ducked once to signify a nod. Her blue eyes, however, were fixed to her lieutenant, whose lip had twitched once as if in wordless protest, telling him to get his mask back on for both their sakes. Jeqon took only the split time of a second to compose himself and gather back the reserve to wipe his face clean of all emotion. The dark smudges across his cheekbones concealed everything, but in return it drew upon the inner animalistic traits that refined his bones and sharpened his senses as if for battle, the feline demon pricking ears that were pointed at the ends. It was far too dangerous to show anything remotely related to disapproval, even if it was a rash reasoning to start a holy war. Much better to shift a little toward the physical change than to provoke the wrath of the devil.

"Assemble the Militia; I want my soldiers ready for breaching the barriers as soon as possible. I will take care of the rest."

Four clawed paws, just small enough to be dainty, but wide enough for powerful stride, clicked softly against the stone floor as Nergal rose, turned, and padded off in search of her errand. Her second backed away from the throne, getting silently and gracefully to his feet and bowing once, very low, to his king and ruler. "Yes, Majesty," he murmured, soft and purring with a surge of feline vocal instinct, and whisked off after his commander with a soundless flurry of dark clothing and hair, leaving behind only the impression of brilliant, eerie green eyes and the remembered texture of the wolf's fur. Leaving their master seated, a slow smile curving his lips.

A smile that was light and airy, rimed with frost. A smile that could have been the source of all the plotting in the universe – most of it ill. But the eyes to pair that ice-carved mouth burned with all the fires of hell.

* * *

At first she didn't remember she was asleep. That was what made the scene so very strange because, in essence, it wasn't altogether that odd for reality's sake, just for something she didn't think she would ever be allowed to witness. Not if _he'd_ had anything to say about it.

She supposed the rumored mythologies really were true, that Death rode a pale horse. Although apocalypse lore wasn't really something she was very familiar with, she recalled skimming over something about it when browsing one of the various texts on religion she had coveted after being introduced to her own personal guardian angel. That was probably why she didn't believe any apocalypse was coming; because it had been in a book. Something about the idea was just too overly dramatized to be real. Yet that didn't mean it couldn't have some grain of truth to it...such as the creamy palomino that stood with its nose pressed to the blade of her angel's shoulder, whickering in a manner that seemed rather concerned.

The main clue that informed her that she was only dreaming was the fact that she was very certain she couldn't possibly be in the heart of the desert, least of all in a desert she didn't know the name to. The second clue was the way Azrael seemed to be pointedly ignoring her, which she honestly didn't think he was capable of doing even if he wanted to. He was standing upright, as straight and tall as ever, yet there was a weight to his bearing that seemed to be pulling him downward toward the rocky, sand-dusted ground stretched beneath his feet. It was both startling and a little unnerving to notice.

Powdery residue from traversing in such a barren wasteland coated his clothes and his hair, streaked the skin of his face like grayish, sickly dirt. Worn woven shirt and grimy brown slacks torn open at the knees sagged and hung loose over his figure, striped by the elastic of weather-stained suspenders and shoes that had definitely seen better days. And his hair...he had dyed it several muddy shades darker than it should have been, or was that the sand and the dried sweat causing the color of the roughly, crudely shorn strands to dull like that? The arrangement of the face she knew so well was drawn and taut, discolored underneath eyes that stared heavenward with a severe amount of pain echoing inside irises that had bleached to a lavender that was very nearly white.

With another whicker and a nervous stamp of a dainty, hoofed foot, the mare butted against the angel's motionless shoulder, hard enough to shove him into reactionary motion. But it was only enough to cause those hurting eyes to close and the tight jaw to lower infinitesimally, and no more.

"_Maa chi'ei..._"

It was such a hoarse whisper, she barely caught it, forced through a throat choked with dust and cracking with something much more uncomfortable. In another moment he had sunk to his knees, wearied, emotional hurt raw and awful across his face, kneeling upon the hard, unforgiving earth. As if appealing to the sky itself to strike him down and end whatever it was causing him so much pain, he threw back his head to repeat the lamented cry, the sheer, hard-wrought agony of the sound scraping like claws down the observing heart. The hand that gripped at his own chest was shaking, nearly feverish with convulsions, made weak by the feeling which caused his head to droop. Shoulders shivered with the vain attempt to swallow tears she somehow knew he desperately didn't want to shed.

Oh, how she wished she _didn't_ know what was hurting him. The past was an unforgiving reminder of what she had been hired to end.

Then...everything changed. The background vanished, leaving nothing but black in its wake. The horse, worried for her master, the dust-coated scenery, the ragged clothing, all of it gone to leave him stripped and vulnerable and kneeling on a surface of unnatural night. Dark skin peeled back to reveal streaks crimson with malice. She didn't quite know when the reddish sheen appeared, irate and angry, coursing through the clouded, convoluted blackness surrounding the pale, naked figure. The body that curled upon the pain beating inside his chest. It just seemed to suddenly be there, curving like evil, diseased wings across Azrael's shoulders, ghostly feathers brushing against bent thighs.

The angel lifted his white-blond head very slowly, so slowly that it couldn't have been real, but by the way he looked at her, it caught at her heart as if she were kneeling right in front of him. Close enough to smell the metallic tang on his breath. Close enough to reach out at smear her fingers with the scarlet that trickled from the edge of his mouth, the trail of scarlet that slid along both cheeks...tears of blood.

Instinctively startled by the touch of gore, Lilith pulled sharply away, alarmed by the nearness as much as she was by the thick crimson liquid that traced harsh lines along perfect skin. The hands that grabbed and held her to the spot did not belong to the kneeling angel, nor did they retain any of the respectful concern for her physical lack of the resilience gifted to natural-born immortals. A grip harder than any steel could have been compressed her arms, digging harshly into the bones to either side of both elbows and held her perfectly still, perfectly still to meet the eyes that looked into hers. Empty eyes, leeched of every single trace of the Azrael she had come to love.

She was deaf to the whisper, unable to process anything but the reach of bloody hands for her face, cupping her cheeks. A scream lodged inside her throat, afraid of the soulless shell that didn't seem to know whether to recognize her or to kill her. The mouth that touched her own was slick and slippery, causing her to gag upon the taste of blood that coated her throat. Again the word was whispered against her lips, that word she knew and yet didn't know at all. So familiar, yet used in a way that threw her knowledge back upon itself.

"_Exodus."_

She woke with something akin to a shudder and sat up quite slowly while rubbing her eyes as if doing so might wipe the clinging remnant of the vision from where it seemed to be flash-burned into her retinas. It might have been considered a little odd to feel so disoriented in her own bedroom, but it hadn't really been even a whole day's time since she'd woken to find her senses gone haywire. Technically she was whole and well, yet part of her still seemed a little off. Of course that could be the result of the dream she had just experienced...

Goodness, but she'd been having some real doozies lately. Strange how several of those more recent had involved blood. A vague brain cell wondered if her subconscious sicko was trying to tell her something. Now that she thought about it, despite the number of occurrences during which she had witnessed Azrael bleeding, not one of those times had seemed quite so _wrong._

Well, perhaps that wasn't the right way to describe it. Maybe there was a better word...in fact, she was certain there was, because there was no way having watched him get sliced up and executed by two different demons (respectively) had been anything else. So while maybe _wrong_ wasn't the right term to use, it was sure as heck on the same level. It had seemed more wrong than the average not good. As if...as if something bad really was going on right as she sat there and tried to process what she'd seen in her mind's eye.

All that blood. When there hadn't been any wounds to birth it.

For some reason – or perhaps the reason wasn't so difficult to understand – the dream had struck her subconscious harder than most ever did. She had suffered some strange and even disturbing dreams in the past, but this one had touched upon something inside her that didn't seem able to recuperate right away. In fact, she tried twice to just close her eyes and go back to sleep like usual, and each time she found the darkness behind her eyelids streaked with red. After five minutes of rolling around and deliberating, she decided she'd had enough and promptly got out of bed.

Common as it was for her personal dream-world to turn sour and even nasty with the clutch of a nightmare's claws, she couldn't help the tiny spurt of nausea. Whether from the blood itself or the fact that it had been blood from a face that had looked so much like her angel that made her sick, she wasn't positive. But would it have mattered either way? She felt too tired to pursue the matter much further.

Exodus...wasn't that the Old Testament book supposedly written by Moses? The account of how the one and true God had delivered the Hebrews from slavery and misery in Egypt? What that had to do with anything, she neither knew nor really cared at that particular moment.

She headed to the kitchen, almost bothered by the lack of grogginess she experienced as a result of being jerked awake. In normal circumstances she should have been running into walls and tripping on her own socks. Being as alert as if she had been awake for hours when she'd just snapped back into consciousness was frankly a little scary. The tap water was in no way the tastiest, but it was cold and did the job of cancelling the somewhat disgustingly sweet coating to the advil she swallowed with the work of dry throat muscle. Dry and rough...as though she'd been screaming.

Coughing lightly to clear her sore throat, she crossed into the living room and flipped on the television. Halfheartedly hoping the white noise would distract her whirring brain and help her back to sleep, she lowered herself slowly and a quite wearily to the couch and curled up in the thick afghan tossed over the back. The room was chilly enough that it seemed to numb her from the outside inwards. Coolness eased the eerie feeling of strange, morbid dream from the back of her consciousness like a repellant directed toward the more negative edges of the psyche. Without the edginess kicking anxious instincts into overdrive, Lilith was reminded of how tired she actually was.

The white noise of the National Geographic special on Monarch Butterflies went completely unnoticed while her head nestled against the blue-green chenille-edged throw pillow and her drowsiness caught back up with her. Adrenaline gone, the vision all but a faintly lingering trace of unpleasant memory, she fell back into slumber. Dreamless this time.

Dreamless, and so absent of warning.

* * *

"So there you are! Rach and I wondered if you'd gone and eloped with your hottie of a boyfriend!" was Sarah's hearty exclamation upon Lilith's return to work after a day's unexpected absence, and she actually had the nerve to look faintly disappointed about its assumedly proven illegitimacy. Then she paused mid-motion, her hand hovering over the shipment tote sitting open in front of her, book in hand, adorned with its labeled slip of paper sticking almost comically from one end. Turning cautious eyes toward her friend, she added slowly, "you didn't...did you?"

Lilith's cheeks went pink, but she shot Sarah a dark, contradictory look while dumping her bag into her locker and detouring to the check-in bins to start scanning. "I'm not _quite_ silly enough to run off to Vegas and get married after just a month." No, just silly enough to barter away her mortality... Because that was a _whole_ lot better.

But Sarah just smiled in that secretive little way of hers – like she knew something no one else did – and promptly changed the subject. "So where were you?" she questioned curiously, plunging her hands back into the half-emptied and sorted tote of holds. Blowing irritably at her fiery bangs to get them out of her face, she adjusted her load and started sorting the slip-laden items into alphabetical order across the top level of the solid metal cart.

"Out sick, if you can believe it," the brunette answered vaguely, hoping the substantial lack of details would go unnoticed.

Soft brown eyes flashed up to her face, concern and sympathy shining deep inside the other woman's expression. "Oh, honey, I'm sorry! TOTM?"

"No, just a bit of the stomach flu," was Lilith's quick correction. She had gone over her excuses already, conjuring up something that was believable for the allotted time period and might explain her sleep-deprived aura. "I think I got it from Jill."

Well, something had been going around, since it was that time of year, and Sarah recognized this with a somber nod and a pat of sympathy for her passing friend's shoulder. Tucking her hands back inside the tote to clear out the mess of slips that had fallen askew she tossed the little papers into the nearest recycle bin and proceeded to scan the items whose slips had been misplaced before lining them up with the rest on her cart. "Jean and Lauren found a dead crow in the parking lot this morning," the redhead chattered, a hint of morbid awe attached to the string of gossip.

Lilith's hand slipped on the book she had lifted from the bin. The tiny paper cut resulting from the slide of the pages across her fingers when she scrambled to catch it before it fell stung a little, like a smooth pinprick gone slightly awry. There was a bit of blood, but she hardly noticed, simply stuck the appendage into her mouth and sucked the hurt away. Her green eyes were turned to Sarah, mildly disgusted by the news she'd chosen to share and unnerved by the way her heart had lurched in silent reply to the bird's common species name. "Eww..." she responded with a wrinkled nose.

"I know, huh? According to Jean it was liquefying when they transported it to the dumpster." The laugh Sarah gave was shrill with a gruesome kind of nervous amusement. Sarah hated gross things with a blinding passion, and yet she'd never seemed capable of leaving them alone. Even if just to talk about. Her hands were drumming nervously along one of the side-bars framing the full cart, clearly mortified just thinking about the deceased crow. "Talk about nasty."

"Go shelve those, Sarah," Lilith suggested patiently, waving the book under the slash of red light and lightly shoving it up the shallow ramp to be sorted.

"Right, sorry. Going!" And off she went to shelve the holds.

The Automated Materials Handling machine (the big, fancy, relatively new conveyer-belt thing which sorted all the scanned, turned-in items into sections to be separated into carts for shelving) was being fussy that morning. Several times she got stuck with one of the red lights blinking away at the end opposite the scanner, grousing irritably under her breath and stalking across the aisle to punch at the clearing buttons and restart the mechanisms which made it work. Around the fifth time, she'd pretty much lost the will to tolerate dealing with the thing anymore and called the technicians to have someone come out and look at it.

It wasn't until she found herself severely put out with a patron who was displeased with the two-hour time-limit on the public computers and demanded to be introduced to the _person in charge_ that she realized just how cranky she was. As to why...she wasn't quite sure. She didn't remember the dream that had done its darndest to deprive her of sleep, no more than it took to acknowledge that something had woken her and caused her to migrate from her bed in the middle of the night and wake to find the TV on. She didn't remember the dark, haunting images shown her by the wandering subconscious. And she didn't know that it was a much coveted skill very unlike that of her mother's. A talent that she neither understood nor knew how to use.

Had she known perhaps she would have been less shocked by what happened later, when most of the shift had passed and night had stained the sky a rich midnight blue. A blue that was soon writhing with a heavy cloud-cover, unhappy and threatening. A cold, grey-washed blue that matched and paired the chill that had seized her heart in that split second of remembrance upon hearing the word _crow_. Why it was so important, she couldn't exactly place. She was beyond thinking about it by then.

Other than the sour, tired mood lurking under her skin, everything seemed normal and uneventful. They dragged along through the afternoon-to-closing shift without too much drama or action, just performing their duties and plodding gradually into an atmosphere that turned lighter as the hours ticked by. It was almost twenty minutes until they closed at nine. The designated Page hadn't yet meandered to the back room to make the first loudspeaker announcement, and Lilith was out exchanging what little troubleshooting know-how she had with Melissa at the circulation desk. She had just picked up the load of books Jill had pulled for her next storytime program to deliver them for checking out.

There was no warning.

It was as if the world was rejecting every creature and item dwelling peaceably on its surface in one violent, spasmodic convulsion. Everything shook, rattled, shuddered – as though a fit of palsy had seized the surface of the planet. As though the earth itself was under so much pressure that it sought to relieve its heavy burden the only way it knew how, with tremors. This was no regular earthquake. The ground didn't simply tremble or even roll as many higher-level quakes tended to make it…the floor pulsated, contorting as though it were dry-heaving, fighting to right a terrible wrong. Hard enough to have probably ripped the entire globe inside out if it carried on for much longer.

And yet almost as soon as it had started, the parried convulsions stopped, leaving only terrible silence in their wake. Stranger still, it left absolutely nothing overturned, fallen, or broken. There had been no damage, despite what had felt like a level ten quake to the humans left stunned and wide-eyed, clutching desk edges and shelves, casting worried looks heavenward while waiting tentatively for any aftershock.

Lilith felt it as clearly as any other person did, the ground shuddering and creaking with distress beneath her feet. But knew, unlike the rest of them, that there was nothing normal about it. She dropped the stack of books she had been carrying, the armload of lightweight paperback tomes spilling over the floor, loose bookmark papers floating about her like dying birds to fall back to the swirled gray and brown carpet. Her hands lifted to her mouth, the tips of her fingers skimming across her parted lips for brief seconds before she dashed for the staff door. Her alarm driven partially by instinct, partially by the sheer weight of the knowledge that anything out of the ordinary surely had something to do with _them._

Moving faster than she had previously thought she was capable, she darted across the floor, leaving a startled and downright fearful staff behind in her scramble. Sarah's doe-brown eyes were wide with surprised apprehension, her white-knuckled hands gripping the arms of a desk chair while she turned cautiously to watch Lilith trip over the basket of books in need of repair the redhead had been charting in the computer files. "That was freaky—" Sarah managed to choke, her voice trembling as horribly as her hands.

Lilith wasn't listening. She had fled passed the work stations, ripping her badge form around her neck and wrenching her coat from the rack and yanking it over her arms. Throwing her weight into the heavy metal-plated back door, she burst into the winter night. She hadn't a clue what had just happened, but she was determined that the reasons for the quake didn't matter so much as finding the man who had just brought her back home the other day.

Absence may have made the heart grow fonder under certain circumstances, as she well knew. Along with broken and longing and hurt. This was something else. This absence made the heart thrum with terror that something had just changed her life forever in a way that neither she nor her powerful guardian had fully anticipated.

Something was _very_ wrong.

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**Hello!!**

**Kind of a short, piecey chapter for you today. One of those that needs to cover quite a bit of ground without being too epic or boring, I hope I managed it ok, I'm a little unsure... We've officially met someone now, if only very vaguely and a little cryptic, we still haven't quite gotten a hold of his motives yet, however, just his excuse. We also saw a little snippet of the past via a dream, and while it isn't quite what I wanted to do with that scene, I'm pretty satisfied with its appearance here...and at least it's getting put to use. What else...oh! I mentioned Lilith's "power." We'll talk more about that later, but I wonder how many of you have hunches about what it is...**

**I realize some of my readers associate themselves with various forms of Christianity. I'm also very glad that no one's taking either this story or themselves too seriously to just enjoy me being a weirdo and screwing with everything the bible says. Thanks for being tolerant! :D**

**Speaking of bible...the idea of Exodus was brought up. This will resurface later (like most things, it seems), but I'm not sure exactly when. It's not too terribly important in itself, but its appearance here is a wee bit significant, though we won't learn both facets to the why until later comes. Sorry, lovelies, I like being convoluted, it seems. Yeah, I totally bashed on Jesus in the last chapter. Not that I hate Jesus, or anything, but I've always had a weird opinion on the Jesus-Judas-crucifixion relationship, which was only bolstered by that find of the Judas Gospel a few years ago. Part of it's me trying to be creative and keep you on your toes, another part is because it's me doing what every author does at least subconsciously.**

**Let's see...I'm also a mythology buff, and I cram a lot of various cultural myths and beliefs in here if I can fit. I was going to feature some Irish mythology in this one, but I decided to leave it for later when I can really hit the idea home. All I'm going to say is it has something to do with the Sidhe. I like to vary the theological references from Christian myth once in a while to remind both myself and my readers that in this world, the idea of God and divinity doesn't just extend to Christians, but to all religions and peoples.**

**I'll avoid preaching too much, but it's the foundation behind my usage of various themes, underlying opinions, controversial topics (remember one chapter Azrael had an encounter with a homosexual man and had no real problem with it?). I just wanted to make a note of that.**

**I had a reviewer tell me that she was vaguely reminded of a certain Edward Cullen from the Twilight epidemic when reading Azrael. To be honest, I'm torn between amused and offended. And not because I'm a Twilight-hater, because I enjoyed the first three books before all this mania hit, and I read the first before it was popular. However, I have a very strong opinion in my lack of enthusiasm for the author's style and her very one-dimensional depiction of her leading male, therefore, while I let my characters seem bland and typical at first, they're usually deeper than they seem. Also, I was writing this story before Twilight was published, and I am not changing my plot-working just because of a super-hyped fandom. That's my polite way to say: please don't bring it up again. I have no need to be compared and contrasted with anyone else's work.**

**On that mildly less than pleasant note...the next chapter's been written, it just needs a ridiculously deep edit session before posting. Shouldn't be too terribly long a wait.**

**Reviews are always appreciated (even the short, brief, or odd ones) and treasured!**

**Until next time!**


	42. No Rest for the Wicked

**Chapter 60: No Rest for the Wicked**

Recommended Listening: "Kyrie" and "Light's Theme" by Yoshihisa Hirano & Hideki Taniuchi [from Death Note], and "Embraced" by Paul Cardell

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The very air crackled. The sky – already dark with December dusk – was darkened unnaturally to a color blacker and deeper than pitch, and completely devoid of stars and moon, or even clouds, sparkling with invisible, quavering energy that made the tiny hairs at the nape of Lilith's neck stand on end. She couldn't say why exactly, but it seemed to her that the wintry cold made the faintly static current even more pronounced than it might have been. It was as if she could feel the veins of it coursing snappily through the air in front of, behind, and all around her, almost too thick to breathe.

Such a sensitivity must have surely come from becoming an immortal. Otherwise she probably would have been just as bewilderedly convinced that it was just a regular earthquake, albeit a large one, like everyone else had. Ignorance was better for them, they didn't know the truth. Real truth, while so adamantly coveted by so many people, was not something that could be handled well by many. Or at least, that had become her assessment.

And what was the truth? That there was nothing natural about this. The way the earth had shuddered, as though it would gladly rip itself apart if it meant relieving the pressure and the pain, had been decidedly and assuredly anything _but_ natural. It had been a pain she'd felt like a tingling surge through her body from her feet to her skull, up from the bowels of the planet's core. As soon as the shuddering ceased, she had simply known it had been otherworldly. Instinctual knowledge, perhaps, driven by what little knowledge she had of magic, and what she'd felt before. What else could have made the earth itself shudder and groan like that?

Something inside of her was shrieking like a banshee. Shrieking about how much of an idiot she was, how stupid it was to be outside where she could be in very real danger of being crushed or flattened wit help from an aftershock. Yet she barely noticed. All she could think about was immortal magic. Magic which, to her, struck a clear path toward the image of Azrael's face.

Azrael; the only real-live magician she had ever known.

She had fled for the door, the closest exit that she could think of, the need to get to him an overwhelming, almost instinctive impulse of a fledgling to her creator. But once she stumbled outside her frenzy had paused, abated under a sudden realization. Even if he _was_ somewhere here, how in god's name would she ever find him? He could find her in nearly a heartbeat, as he had proved numerous times, but she didn't have a clue as to how to track him. She had no means with which to do so.

Clutching the collar of her coat closer to her bare throat, she peered around at the dark and empty street that lay before her, uneasy with hesitation. Her stomach clenched, the cold of the air around her forgotten as she felt the breath churn with static in her lungs. She felt sickened, wrong, like she was burning with nonexistent pain for a reason she didn't understand but couldn't ignore. Something was happening; and not knowing what it was scared her to the bone. Was her angel in danger? She would find him…she _had_ to find him. But how?

"Miss. Gandion, I presume?"

Lilith started, jumping at least a half a foot into the air (or that's what it felt like), her heart launching into a wild, haphazard frenzy of beating while she whirled around to see who had spoken. There seemed to be no one, just a blank, swathed sea of nightfall. Anxiously biting her lip, her feet spread farther apart, her stance lengthened, prepared to run if she needed to. "W-who's there?"

Out of the shadows that surrounded the back lot behind the library, stepped a man – a man so strikingly handsome that she'd have bet money any woman he passed on the streets would be rendered breathless for ten straight minutes at the very least. No joke. He was tall, very tall, with hair combed tidily back against his skull and eyes black as coal, nicely complimenting the tailored suit that sleekly draped a toned, muscular body. His face was carved and aristocratic, gently rounded at cheekbones and chin, with a straight, graceful nose which gave him highly scholarly look. With fine, gently-shaped lips to counter a stern chin, he was physically very attractive, but there was a certain vibe he gave off...something cold and distant. Something she couldn't quite place, but which made her a little wary.

"Miss. Gandion," he repeated, without the little lilt of a question this time, his voice as dark as his bottomless eyes and smooth as warmed velvet. "My name is Uriel. I have come to fetch you to my younger brother, Azrael." He said it with little feeling, more businesslike than anything else. Yet while many businessmen held a tinge of haste and bustle to their demeanors, this man's attitude held a distinct impression of languidity as though he had all the time and patience in the world.

Still, she stared at him. Uriel the Watcher; fire of God, one of the four great archangels, standing with her in the back lot of a city library…who would ever have thought anything like this could happen to someone so ordinary. But her awe was quickly outweighed by her naturally developed sense of mistrust. Her eyes narrowed, suspicion creeping up into her mind's eye as she glared at the dark man before her. "How can I trust you?" Dealings with even as little of the immortal spectrum as she had held, she knew better than to trot along with him without some hearty proof to support the stranger's claim. She was not stupid enough to trust nothing but a powerful name.

The frosted rhododendron bushes to either side of the library's back door rustled loudly, leaves shuddering and clicking against one another and against the wall, caught by a breeze that neither body felt. He moved so suddenly that Lilith's eyes couldn't even have hoped to follow him, gripping her by the arms and pulling her away from the structure. Shielding her with his own body by putting his back to the questionable bushes. At the same time, a savage ripping slashed the air and the soft whisper of feathers brushed against her cheek. She gasped, glancing up to see the edge of wings, black as the dusky sky and flecked with russet brown, curling around her in a protective fold. Well that was proof enough for her. He really _was_ who he claimed to be.

Uriel moved away from the rear of the library, gently tugging Lilith with him as he began to walk down the side-alley and toward street which led to the heart of New York City. "It isn't safe," he told her quietly. One powerful arm braced her securely against his side, blanketed underneath the sleek black feathers which had burst from the charcoal, pinstriped Armani suit-jacket. And that seemed to be all he was willing to say.

_Oh, no._ No way in hell was she going to settle for that.

She wrenched away from the firm, if loose, grip the angel held on her arm, breaking away from the fold of the sleek, dark wing. "_What_ is going on?" she demanded, and her voice squeaked with the vehemence that sprang from a sudden wellspring of feeling. Determined to have her questions answered she glared up at him, the fierce flash of temper almost abrasive against the cool expression that gazed blankly back at her. "And don't bother telling me everything's fine or anything—I _know_ something's wrong. The earth _convulses_ like it's a woman in labor, the air's _throbbing_ with something I can't see, the sky's all dark, it's cold, and—and…"

The near-hysterical tirade hurled itself into an uneasy silence. Having run out of steam to vent the multiple wrongnesses collecting around them, her words staggered to a cease, nearly choking on the sob that (she was frustrated to note) spoke very clearly of tears to come. Yet she couldn't say it. She couldn't give voice the thing that frightened her the most. Surely, surely Azrael should have come by now, either to reassure or administer direction. He should have, had he been capable.

A large, smoothly callused hand tucked her chin, gently tilting her face upward. She sniffled, embarrassed by the witness to her loss of composure, blinking through watery eyes to do as he so clearly wished to look at him. To her curiosity and surprise she noticed a thin, tidy scar marking the left side of his jaw, small and iridescent with age, neatly matched to the pearlescent shade of his skin. So small, it couldn't have been more than a nick with some kind of sharp object. She wondered then, both curious and very slightly disturbed, about what could have possibly had the power to scar an angel. From what she had seen, they were a resilient species. Then her focus shifted and she found herself lost in his eyes.

Once she had thought the pressure of her guardian's gaze was piercing to the point where it had bothered her. It had felt as though Azrael's sight could dig into pieces of her soul, dissect her innermost feelings and quirks with no more effort than it took to blink. But now she realized that while Death had a powerful set of eyes on him, they were simply not comparable to the stare of the Watcher. While Azrael could use the magnetic pull of his eyes to aid him in conjunction with his voice, Uriel would not have needed the second element.

The only word she had to describe the intensity of the pressure from Uriel's eyes was _immense._ From his stare alone, she got the very real impression that he could see right through her. He could peel back the layers of her skin and get at the deepest facets of her insides, from instinctual, physical reactions like the beat of blood to the race of her thoughts. Her nerves were useless, motion inhibited, as if the connections from her brain simply weren't capable of communicating with her body anymore. Her breath had caught. Her heart rate considerably more lethargic than it should have been, as if he was controlling the pace with a sliver of a thought. And she realized she was about as complex as an open book so long as he exerted the energy to read it. There was something very humbling about that. Humbling and downright scary.

Suddenly she had a very canny understanding of the term _elf-struck_. Sure, people in more primitive times had used it for fairies, but where had the foundation for the fairy-folk come from in the first place? Right now, with those deep, bottomless spirals of blackness boring into her eyes, she was pretty sure she knew the answer to that one.

All of a sudden it was like the seconds which passed were rushing to catch up with themselves – and she had no doubt at all that he could very well have stopped time had he wished. Uriel's obsidian stare eased in intensity, it seemed, for a subtle softness touched the cool, expressionless edge to his face. He was merely looking at her instead of looking into her when he murmured, "hush, child. I will answer your questions." His fingertips slid from her chin.

Released from the spell that wasn't a spell at all, it was an easy natter to see how very different Uriel was from the other immortals she had stumbled across. He seemed so much older, age and experience peeking through wise eyes and laden light like a shapeless design across sculpted cheekbones, though he looked as youthful and beautiful as a man just approaching his thirties. Lovely in that untouchable sort of way, the way that seemed too pure and good to be real. Yet she was quickly learning that even the angels seemed to have their own touches of darkness.

The archangel wore his power much more subtly than his brother did. Not to say Azrael's cloak of strength was crude or purposely flashy, it was just that Death's aura flowed around him like energy that was too potent and too large to be contained. Uriel could simply hold his spirit force in check. He tucked it close around his body so efficiently that it was no wonder why she hadn't immediately recognized him as an angel. From what little she understood, Uriel's power was not strong in magic, and undoubtedly less flexible than his brother's was, yet she was sure when he did choose to unleash it, his strength would pack a serious punch.

One didn't earn the title of archangel without having a bit of blunt weight to throw around. And not meaning influence in just the aspect of brawn.

He was turning his face away, adjusting his posture with a fluid shift of muscled body-mass. The wings at his back looked a little ruffled around the edges, as though the rapid burst through several layers of expensive clothing had jostled some of the feathers, to which he paid little mind. "Your lover is well enough," he told her, the naturally husky tone low in his throat, "so still your tears."

Lilith felt her already dissipated emotional shivers melt into a hot blush of embarrassment. "My—"

"Lover, yes. I know what you are to my brother," he cut off the meek, flustered chirp, eyes intent upon the world around them with an intent, analytic scan. "But come, we must hurry. I will explain on the way." Beckoning to her with a beguiling hand, he continued down the street.

It was very odd. The streets were completely deserted, wiped clean of all the usual bustle and activity, strange for such an early hour, and strange for the heart of New York City. Like the tremors had driven earth to banish her children into seclusion. Scrambling to follow in his distinctly larger steps, Lilith regarded the angel with a new respect and a generous amount of newfound trust as she waited. She found his utterly calm and direct assessment of her relationship with Azrael to be unexpectedly supportive. "To make a rather long and complicated story much shorter, the divine realms are at war."

"They what?" she gasped, alarmed and narrowly avoiding tripping over her own feet. "Since when?"

"As of tonight," came his answer, followed with a succinct weave of details trimmed for speed. "Lucifer is less than pleased...with a number of things, most ardently with God's laws regarding the freedom and mobility of his people, which binds his hands. He has taken it upon himself to challenge heaven's authority in the only manner he still understands how. The plan was getting his message of repeated rebellion to the Almighty by using her mortal children's lives as a collection of hostages and used his power and that of several of his princes to compress the earth's core, make it feel the need to relieve pressure that was not truly there."

"The earthquake…" she whispered.

"Yes," Uriel acknowledged her with a nod. One hand reached for her sleeve and lightly tugged to encourage a quicker pace. "The tremors would have caused the planet to rip herself apart. Fortunately one of our generals was attuned to the wellbeing of the earth at the time and stepped in to throw off their assault spells. Unfortunately, such openly aggressive actions from both parties has reduced us to warfare. Hardly anywhere is safe…the balance between the realms will be in chaos for who knows how long—"

_Attuned to the wellbeing of the earth..._

Lilith stopped dead in her tracks, her heart suddenly frozen like an apple-sized knot at the back of her throat. "The angel who stopped the earthquake," she whispered, feeling almost too weak to muster enough vigor to display the fear and concern she felt crushing her insides. Of course. No wonder he hadn't been at her side in an instant. He'd been...otherwise engaged.

"Yes, Azrael," Uriel stated softly, confirming her thoughts in time to see her wince, eyes closed and mouth shut in a tight line as though if she slipped she might scream. "He used all the power he had in hopes of shattering the spell…and managed. All on his own, no less." There was a distinct swell of pride in the angel's tone when he said this; pride for a younger sibling's outstanding accomplishment. "However, the draining has reduced him to a completely mortal form. He is extremely weakened from his interference and, for a time, he will be unable to heal himself." Noticing Lilith's horrified expression he added, "his condition is stable. In truth he is quite well off for the amount of strain he put himself through. Pandora is tending to him now."

"And he sent for me?" she questioned, very much relieved even despite the mild tremble to her voice.

The look Uriel gave her was long and difficult to read, his dark eyes focused steadily on her face for a long, eerily silent moment before he answered. "No," he stated slowly. "No, he passed out cold almost instantly after blocking the spell."

"But then—" she stopped. If she hadn't been sent for, then Uriel had come to retrieve her of his own will. That meant he either thought Azrael needed her presence, or had somehow known everything that had happened, known that she would be on the edge of panic without someone to give her news. This was one angel, at least, who understood the depth of the bond his brother had developed with her. Understood and seemed to regard with approval.

It was when she realized they had come to one of the crossroads just a quarter-mile away from Central Park that he gripped her shoulder with a steady hand and stopped in her feet from taking another step. His gaze was weighty and full of that unspoken pressure again, making every nerve in her body stand on end. Eyes that had no end; pools of fathomless darkness seeing everything that lay before him without veil.

"Miss," he began quietly, "I told you that my brother is in stable condition, which he is, but it is important for you to recognize that he is not looking or feeling his best right now. The effort and power he used to break Lucifer's spell took a large toll on the body he is using." The volume seemed to hush even more, courteous with a kind of empathy that was crafted to be sturdy as he expected was required. Empathy and understanding for her attachment to the subject. "He has several broken ribs, a severely lacerated lung, numerous strained and ripped muscles, torn joints, among a few cuts and bruises and scrapes." After a pause filled with watchful appraisal, he inquired bluntly, "can you handle that?"

It was hidden delicately inside the words he chose to use, but Lilith interpreted his meaning perfectly. Lifting her chin just the tiniest bit, she retorted, "if you're warning me not to be a wreck when I see him, you don't have to. I may be just a human but I understand what's going on." Once finished, she realized how rude she had just been to one of the archangels, and ducked her head to indicate remembered politeness.

The corner of Uriel's mouth twitched with something not too far from the hint of a smile just before he turned back to the road which was quickly easing into the opening to Central Park. At first there was nothing that looked in any way out of the ordinary. No, the oddity became clear only once they drew nearer to the edge of the trees and Lilith caught sight of rather generously sized a white tent that had been hitched amid the lush greenery of the plants.

Lilith let the angel's hand at her back guide her along the shadow-swathed pathway, picking her way around what few roots and snarls she could see with the aid of a tiny flame that licked along the tips of Uriel's empty fingers. He held the hand aloft to help her see, yet the scenery blurred before her eyes. The only thing that didn't smear clear was the pure white of the tent – obviously makeshift and hitched in a hurry. Nothing inside her, however, had attention for anything but a tumult of thoughts. She was almost afraid of what she would see inside. Would he be conscious? Would he be in too much pain to recognize the world around him? Did she even want to know?

"There you are." He had led her right up to the tied-down flap of fabric serving the structure as a door, even reaching out and parting it for her to enter though it was clear he did not mean to follow. She very nearly faltered. But once again the angel's hand pressed gently to the spot between her shoulder blades and she stepped through the gap, her eyes immediately focusing on the one source of movement in the small, cloth-walled room.

Pandora was recognizable almost immediately from her commanding rule over a small, collapsible table laden with six heavy bags stuffed with medical supplies. Her red hair flamed under the light exuded from a small, floating globe which followed her as she rummaged around for an object or ingredient that seemed to be evading her searching hands. She was a petite thing, only a few centimeters taller than Lilith herself, but she had an air about her that led an observer to believe she probably could have taken and held her own against even the most imposing of adversaries in more than one fashion. That in itself was testimony toward the fact that Pandora, chief medical expert of hell (and demon), was openly supporting heaven's cause.

There was another woman in the room, so young of face that her age-impression couldn't have been more than fifteen…yet after another second she looked simply ancient. Another passed and young again. Over and over, a slow, subtle illusion of the like Lilith's eyes had difficulty defining. Her white hair was thin and long and lush, reaching almost to her waist. Her eyes were a clear, crystal blue that flickered over to glance mutely at the newcomer, and Lilith could actually feel her brain pound with confusion when she saw that the woman had the wide shoulders and smoother chest of a man underneath a fine, silver-threaded shirt.

Pandora looked up, smiling a bit wearily at the brunette girl backed by the shadowed white cloth. "Hello, hun. He's over there," she jerked her head in the direction of the far side of the tent room then turned back to the white-haired woman…man, and handed him a small packet of green paper. "Thanks, Gabe. Just give that to Raphael and—"

The rest was tuned out as Lilith's focus diverted to the cot indicated by the flash of red hair and the body lying still as a corpse atop the hard, thin pad of a mattress.

His fair hair shorter than she remembered it – cropped to feathery, layered bangs from cheekbone to chin and cut short at the back, splayed loose across the wad of canvas that had been rolled into a pillow. Streaks of dust dulling the fine gold, just as it smeared the clothes that hugged his body. Clothes which had been nearly mutilated. The fabric was torn in places, shreds of fabric hanging from him in bloodstained strips though they had once been of finest quality, white and black muslin trimmed with silver thread. Fancy clothes, however, did nothing to ease the copious number of shallow (and some not so shallow) cuts that cleaved and stained his beautiful skin a deep, angry red.

Her hands were shaking, but she ignored that in favor of reaching out to smooth back a wisp of hair from his lovely face. She wondered if he was in pain – if that blue tinge that colored his lips, circled his eyes, and tinted his skin was a bad sign. At the same time, she marveled at the power he'd used exhausting himself in order to keep the planet alive. And she wondered if it was worth seeing him like this. Her mental catalogue of the injuries Uriel had listed ran over and over through her head, and as she scanned her guardian's bludgeoned body, she added to it with a grim set to her mouth and sympathetic sorrow in her eyes.

Eyes which were momentarily distracted by the particularly nasty-looking wound in his left side, stretching along the ribs beneath the chest. God, that was a lot of blood...

"Don't look so frightened." She jumped for what felt like the fiftieth time that night when the dust-choked voice reached her ears. Her head snapped upward, and though the tendon in her neck protested with a small shock of pain she hardly felt it. It was impossibly to feel anything but delighted relief when his pair of pale lavender eyes slid slowly open to settle on her image – familiar and gentle, and hazed with exhaustion. His lips parted again, the lower split down the side, bleeding faintly with a small trickle of scarlet as he murmured hoarsely, "I'm not as bad as I look."

Relieved by the sign of life, Lilith offered her angel a smile (quite proud of the fact that it wavered only once to show she was anything but calm), and wiped the blood from his lips with the edge of her sleeve. There was a touch to her arm, which lay flat against the mattress to brace the weight leaning over the angel's bloodied, dirt-smeared torso, his fingertips feeling their way down to her hand. He tucked his fingers around the back of her palm, thumb gently stroking the back of her wrist, but the gesture was so weak and taxed...as if it had taken more strength than he had intended to move even this tiny amount. The green of her eyes was tuned back to worry channel in an instant.

"No, you're worse." Pandora stepped quietly up behind Lilith, having seen the androgynous, white-haired man out through the flap. One scarlet eyebrow was experimentally quirked while she eyed her patient to match the hand on her hip in an almost scolding gesture, the other wrapped around a sterile white mug containing a thick orange liquid. "Come on," the medic bid, "let's get you up-sat."

Azrael's grip tightened around her hand, bracing the other against the hard surface of the cot beneath him as he struggled to move. Reacting on instinct that balked against seeing him in pain, Lilith slid her arm behind his back and helped him with the use of her shoulder to prop his back until he was sitting up. Sure, his face was drawn with a grimace, but he was upright. And it was evident that it had taken a great deal of energy even with help. His limbs were shivery, held in a way that made her think of an infant uncertain of how to use the weight of his body, and because of it, the weight worked against him, bearing down on him. Adjusting the bundle of canvas so that it cushioned the cot's metal-framed headboard, she assisted him in leaning backward, propped against it with nothing but a low exhale and tense muscles to betray any discomfort.

He squeezed her fingers. "Thank you."

Pressing a hand to his forehead, Pandora took a reading of her patient's vitals through a swift skillful management of personal gift which seemed to tell her everything from heart rate and blood-pressure to how many tears he had accumulated within five seconds. Apparently whatever she found was satisfying enough, for she took her hand back to replace it by holding out the mug of liquid. "Here you are, drink up."

He took the cup from her and lifted it to his mouth. As soon as the liquid touched his throat, he convulsed, lurching forward with a retch, jerking his head to the right and spewing orange all over the side of the tent. Coughing, he held his free hand to his ribs, as though they might shatter unless he kept them in place and choked, "Iaheva _Almighty!_" He slumped back against the canvas-pillowed headboard, chest heaving. "What the _blazes_ are you trying to do, woman? Poison me? That is the most _disgusting—_"

"Well what'd you expect?" Pandora groused, in a right temper as she proved by flailing rather wildly, "Champagne? _Honestly…_" Grumbling incoherently to herself as she did so, she snatched back the mostly-emptied mug and stomped across the ground, picking up the jug sitting next to her supply bags. The container held more of the orange liquid, with which she refilled the mug before shoving it back into the angel's hands. "Now drink it. _All_ of it, mind, it'll help your lungs." Scowling fiercely and imperviously down at him, she crossed her arms across her chest and waited.

Something about this exchange Lilith found quite amusing. While she'd known for a while now how much of a softie the angel was, watching him take such a verbal bullying from the fiery female only emphasized it. It was quite cute in its way.

With a sigh and an expression of immense distaste written all over his features, he looked down at the mug in his hands and surrendered meekly, "yes, ma'am." A sudden remnant of the usual sparkle hinted at the corners of his eyes, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth when his gaze shifted to Lilith's wordless observation. Lifting the mug in her direction, he murmured briefly, "cheers," and tipped his head back to drink while. He downed the contents in three large swallows, then lowered the mug to his lap with a disgusted frown and a shudder, the slurred curses issuing from his tongue pulling a smatter of giggling from the brunette kneeling beside his cot.

"Well at least I didn't make you pee in a cup, hmm?" Pandora lipped sarcastically as she took back the mug, yet she couldn't quite suppress a small smile. To Lilith she said in a quaint, conversationally friendly manner, "so you know that there's war between heaven and hell. Well, your laddybuck, here," she pointed to Azrael and the eyebrow he'd just quirked, "just put himself out of commission for a few days. I'm good enough…but not _that _good. I can't fix up four broken bones, a billion strained muscles, and a lacerated lung as fast as usual in this realm where my power takes a beating from barrier spells. Besides, I've gotta get my butt to the front, Raphael has his work cut out for him there and I'm set on helping. Can't stay and baby-sit as much as I'd simply love to."

Here Azrael gave a rather undignified snort.

"But the _point_ is," she continued with a brief interlude with consisted of a petulant tongue being stuck out in the angel's direction, "we need someone to look after him, and you're the best possible option. I can't transport him to Eden without help, and the trip would only injure him more. Plus," she added, turning slightly to reseal the jug of liquid at her table, "you already know what's going on so we don't have to involve or risk any unknowing bystanders."

Lilith smiled warmly up at the medic and tucked her ponytail over her shoulder. "Of course I'll watch him," she replied steadily. "You really don't have to ask."

"Thanks hun," Pandora answered, her silvery gray eyes gentling with the relief that softened her pixie-like face. "I can only transport you to your street_—_angel boy put some damn strong protection on your apartment," she looked faintly amused by that for some reason, "but I think he'll be able to make it from there. Won't you?" she gave her patient an inquiring glance, to which Azrael responded with a wordless thumb's-up. She shook her head, sighing with a minute touch of exasperation for the typical seraph superhero-invincibility complex. Lifting the liquid-carrying container by the strap hanging from its lid, she told the girl, "give him the rest of that tomorrow with something solid to eat, like eggs or something, and I'd say…oh, about four days of bed-rest. Have him take it easy for a while. You'll know when he's strong enough to get up again."

Though she was a little intimidated by the idea of taking care of a severely injured anyone, Lilith's nod was sure and eager while she accepted the jug and slipped it over her shoulder. She didn't doubt that Azrael would make it very clear when he was ready to be up and about. The angel had a way of asserting his own capabilities; and to be honest, it was nice to know he was probably going to heal rather quickly.

"Good, good," Pandora mused, clapping her hands together. " Let's get his lordship up, shall we?"

Azrael complied with Pandora's words without a peep of argument. He was completely wordless while edging his legs to the side of the cot in preparation to stand up, though he treated his movement with the gingerly sluggish pace of one testing the extent of pain tolerance. Lilith offered her assistance by slipping her arm around his waist, her fingers gripping tightly to the rich fabric of his shirt, her other hand gathering a firm hold of the arm Azrael had loosely slung across her shoulders, gripping his wrist. The sheet covering the cot's surface slithered loose with a subdued rustle when Pandora's expert hands rested against the angel's chest and back, glowing with a light sheen of red fire. A preventative insurance against any bad spill that might result.

As Lilith helped him to stand, she gritted her teeth under the strain her body took to keep him upright. Though he was doing his best to support himself, he was still quite weak and the majority of his weight fell to the small, slender girl tucked beneath his arm. Had he been any lighter, any shorter, perhaps it wouldn't be such an effort. But he was tall, practically all muscle, and _heavy_. Once situated comfortably as she could manage, she spared a glance for her guardian's face. At the sight of his sweat-beaded brow, closed eyes and clenched jaw, she felt a stab of horrible empathy for the pain he must have been in. Realizing that her hand was at level with his torso, and possibly putting pressure against broken ribs, she asked worriedly, "am I hurting you?"

"No, darling," he whispered, and it was hoarse with effort despite the hand which blanketed her own, and the placement she'd questioned. "You're fine. Don't worry about that."

The words might have been steady but his hands were shaking, trembling against her knuckles and shoulder, and the use of contractions told her that he was not being very truthful. She gave him another look, full of the concern that felt like it was clawing her insides open and wished that she could take his hurt away. It was so hard to watch him shaking and sweating like a helpless, feverish child. She wanted to lay him back down and wash all the blood and dirt away, to soothe and bandage the angry red cuts that sliced his pale, tired skin. She wanted to take the pain away. But she couldn't think of anything to do for him, other than to take whatever other instructions there were to be had and get him home.

Pandora's silvery eyes were narrowed just slightly as she silently studied her patient's state, unstable and suffering enough physical shock-weakness to render almost half of his own muscle mass useless. She knew was trying to suppress the trembling of his own limbs; attempting to use every bit of the strength he had left in order to carry some of his own weight. She knew that he felt terrible to have to burden Lilith – though she sincerely doubted his girl minded at all. Personally, she would have bet money that all Lilith cared about was being sure that Azrael was reasonably alive. She could only imagine how much the brunette was itching to rip off his battered clothing and reassure herself that he really was still in one piece.

She laughed lightly and very gently patted the angel's uninjured collarbone. "Steady, boy," she warned, "I foresee a good deal of prodding in your future."

Lilith blushed, sweet and priceless as a fresh virgin, the blood staining her pale cheeks pink. Her charge's purple flashed with a brief violet spark of humor while he peered at the redhead through golden bangs. "I'm not sure whether to be offended or flattered," he retorted, voice smoothly clear of even the slightest hint of a quaver.

Pandora made a face at him. "Nyah to you too," she snapped, lifting a palm to rest on the touching wrists settled at Lilith's shoulder. "See you when you're better, tiger," she bid Azrael with a coy smile, and to the mortal girl she teased gently, "don't let him run you ragged. Four days bed-rest, remember…and no squirreling around until he's back on his feet!" And with that, the very world around them seemed to blur.

The sickly, lurching sensation was nowhere to be found this time. While the mechanics were the same, the physical contact drawing the bodies through space that warped and melted and reshaped, Lilith found herself blinking, surprised, by the lack of dizziness and discomfort she had thought would be normal. Right before her eyes the tent interior and the woman inside it became a whirl of shadows intermingled with light. Or, was it light intermingled with shadow? The shadows swelled, like pieces of a puzzle fitting neatly together in correct order to form another picture as perfect as the one that had been eliminated. Kings Street, _exactly_ one block down from her apartment, as promised.

Though this street was just as empty and ghostly quiet as the other had been, there was a certain edge of comfort underlying the cold, winter evening – a kind she suspected that came from the knowledge that a safe place wasn't too far away. As with any creature, the idea of home was a place where nothing bad could ever happen, no one could hurt her. Even when that ideal had been jeopardized, it was still ingrained into the psyche, and knowing that home was close offered a coil of warmth to temporarily ease any anxiety she may have been feeling underneath.

Impressed with such a smooth transition (probably experienced because her immortalized skin wasn't so negatively affected by the magic now), she muttered briefly, "wow, that was different." Azrael nodded stiffly, mute in his agreement, his eyes closed as if the trip had made him dizzy. Lilith's green irises scanned his expression with a dire kind of appraisal, noting the slight furrow of his brow and the tiny frown line at the corner of his otherwise perfect mouth. A drop of sweat trailed down his temple, cutting a clear track through the dust that powdered his skin like makeup, and she knew the sooner she got him inside, the better off he would be. With another ponderous look she decided that a hot bath would be good for him – to wash all the dirt off, clean out the numerous cuts, slough away the dried blood, and soothe his stressed, aching body.

Careful not to jostle or pinch him, she readjusted her grip around his waist, curling her fingers into the fabric of his shirt, and paused to check for any sign of pain. His expression remained tight and blank of emotion as it had before, but the hand lying lightly over hers smoothed over the back of her wrist, silently reassuring her that he was no worse for her grip. "Can you walk at all?" she asked him softly, hoping beyond hope that he could. She was not altogether very confident that she could drag him down the block.

His hair fluttered about his face when he nodded again, voice soft as a cloud as he whispered, "yes, I think so." Of course he could. If he could prevent some of the most powerful beings in hell from ripping the earth apart, then he could probably do almost anything he set his mind to. She just hoped that his body could keep up with his ambition.

"Ok then. Ready?" He nodded mutely, and she took a hesitant step forward. Almost catching her off guard, he moved with her – trudging and slow, perhaps, but he was definitely walking, booted feet scuffing heavily against the cement. He kept up with her extremely well, better than she thought he would have been able to, though she knew it must be costing him great amounts of energy to do so. He was still rather heavy, but the momentum gained from the walk made him easier to partially lift and keep upright. So much easier in fact, that she didn't notice her steps becoming longer, growing faster, until he clutched at her hand, administering a soft pressure hard enough to call her determined attention to her pace.

Clenched horribly with guilt, her stomach twisted inside her belly. How could she have been so careless to forget about how much pain he was in? "I'm sorry!" she squeaked, horrified, and immediately slowed, measuring her steps to be smaller and lighter in speed.

Azrael's fingers relaxed, his touch returning to a mere reassurance against her wrist. "It's all right."

Alarm bells rang piercing and shrill inside her mind, cued by the wasted rasp underlining his voice and the faint tremble to his limbs. This was _not _good. He needed to get inside. He needed to rest, to recuperate and heal. Every moment she lingered was another small added dose of agony, and as she took in the hard clench of his jaw a sense of incredible, affectionate sympathy fueled her urgency to get him inside, cleaned up, and lying down.

She was downright relieved to see the entrance to the apartment complex just a few yards away. "We're almost there," she encouraged brightly despite feeling a little out of breath. But sometimes in life the good things end up being too good to be true, and that was the instant she decided she loathed those instances with a passion. The groan she let loose when she caught sight of the stairs and remembered that she lived on the fourth floor. And sure enough, as they slowly rounded the corner, there was the covered stairwell she took on autopilot every single day. And, wouldn't you know, they weren't really wide enough to service more than one and a half people at a time.

"Stupid stairs…" she grumbled reproachfully, annoyed by the obstacle they served. "I guess we'll have to go sideways. You first—"

"No." The volume and firmness to the objection startled her, and she nearly jumped out of her skin when he interrupted. Turning her head to look at him with open inquiry, she saw his head was lifted, eyes open and focused, assessing the situation by scanning the narrow, almost tunneled stairway. "_You_ first. That way, if I fall, you will land on top." She opened her mouth to protest to this, but he interrupted again before she could begin to voice the stricken exclamation at her lips. "I would rather risk dying in this body then break every bone you have." With a small sigh he gestured forward with a pair of fingers, the aura that had flared brighter momentarily fading back to the shallow, grayed shade of a man wearied and hurt. It wiped all thought of protest from her brain. Which was probably the idea.

Shifting her body weight, she turned so her right side was angled toward the stairwell, helping him along beside her while she started upward with an incoherent grunt against the timid yelp of her back and leg muscles. He obliged, moving at her discrepancy as she climbed, paused, shifted, turned, adjusted, and resumed climbing. His side was pressed flush to hers, hip-to-hip while he dragged himself after her, using the handrail as a clutch to avoid bruising her shoulder or arm with any amount of strength he might have had left. Step after step, stair after stair, one after another – a shared, silent mantra to accompany their plodding ascension up the four seemingly endless flights of stairs.

Perspiration made her grip slide and waver. Her hold on him was weakening, her damp hands quickly growing just as tired as the rest of her felt, and Lilith gritted her teeth against the strain. Pulling a grown man's weight up the cement steps was proving an enormous challenge for her. Being slight and small of body, her muscles were meant for balance and to hold her own mass and not much more than that. Acting as support for Azrael was difficult enough on its own, but to add climbing several long flights of stairs at a slanting angle while already physically and emotionally weary… Her strength was not meant to withstand such conditions, yet will seemed to be enough to overcome it. On she climbed, resolutely towing the wounded angel behind her.

Once they scaled the last of the stairs they were greeted by the small, confined concrete landing which ended abruptly with the heavy metal door leading to the fourth floor apartments. Lilith paused here and blinked up at the cold gray door with its painted number 4, chewing absently at her bottom lip. Situated as they were, she couldn't reach the handle without releasing Azrael's body, and if she were to let him go he would probably fall hard on the cement floor. That would be a definite step backward, she figured. Still, they had to get in somehow. Perhaps if she shifted to the side and angled her back to the stairs...

Azrael stretched out his free arm and reached for the lever-shaped handle, trembling, sweat-dampened fingers sliding against the cool metal. Yet he managed to get a solid enough grip by tilting his wrist and tipping the barrier so a tiny crack of light showed through the gap between it and the wall. Lilith quickly wedged her toe between door and jam, hopping only a little while she shifted until he was out of the way and pushed the heavy door open with a hearty use of leg muscles. Maneuvering slowly and quite awkwardly, they performed an oddly crab-like shuffle into the bright hallway, somehow managing to bypass the obstacle without suffering any serious damage. Just a stubbed toe or three.

She ignored the white walls, the twin row of doors, and focused her attention solely on walking her charge to the door that was hers. Just when she caught sight of her slightly peeling address digits, she remembered that she needed something. "You don't think you could reach my keys, do you?" she inquired, glancing at him over the slope of his shoulder.

"Where are they?"

"My right-hip pocket."

"Sure, if I move a little." Turning slowly and quite gingerly, Azrael transferred his weight to his right side as he pivoted on wavering, unbalanced feet. Their shoulders touched, Lilith's arm hugging more snugly around his waist while he adjusted to face her. She gritted her teeth against the movement which brought the soreness from hefting his weight down the block and up four flights of stairs, the strain chewing with blunt teeth along her back, shoulders and arms. Not quite a scream, more than the pleasant ache of a few rough stretches. But once he found a place where he could half-stand and half-lean, braced against her weight, without tipping over, it eased just a little.

His hand, reaching for the pocket in question, brushed against the front zipper of her slacks. A startled gasp broke the still air. Lilith's cheeks flamed a brilliant pink while Azrael instinctively pulled back from the jerk of sound he had for so long associated with negativity and discomfort. She couldn't breathe – could only stare straight ahead at the silver embroidery emblazoned around the gap in his shirt-front, not really seeing it. Such an intimate touch, unintended, even, yet it had swept the sense right from her brain. For a solid, floating moment she knew was the tingling electricity that shook her nerves, the flutter at the back of her throat, doubling the pace of her heart. He hadn't touched her like that since...

"I'm sorry," Azrael murmured, and while the words were apologetic, they were also quite stripped for any of the emotion he should have been emitting. Though that wasn't exactly his fault. He attempted another reach, fingers repositioned a few inches in order to slip between the denim layers of her pocket, hooking around the ring of captive keys and tugging them out. "Here you are," he handed her the key-ring and prepared his body to shift back toward a more mobility-friendly position.

Suddenly, the breath in his throat simply stopped. The angel swayed on his feet, balance deteriorated under a spell of nausea and dizziness that flickered inside his eyes like a spark of white while his shoulders slumped and his body tipped dangerously to the side. He was going to fall. The realization snapped Lilith out of her daydream in a virtual instant, panic stabbing at her heart as she saw his head tip backward. His lovely white throat exposed beneath a high, stiff collar – a sign of weakness and surrender old as time and, from him, brutally frightening.

Reflex kicked in, her limbs moving more quickly then she could have commanded them on her own when she lurched forward to catch him before he hit the floor, knowing that it would be impossible to get him up again on her own. Yet as she wrapped her arms around the trim male waist, she understood immediately that without his minute amount of help to support his weight, there was no way she could hold him. Without any other choice to fall back on, she instinctively threw out her arms and used his momentum to pin him against the closest wall. Most likely jarring those broken ribs and torn lung while she did so. The poor man...

Azrael hissed a curse as his back knocked into the hard surface, his chest throbbing as thoroughly as if a jackhammer had just assaulted him. The breath he drew burned his dry throat and injured lung, causing the tiny fractures in his bones to creak and pop. For a split second he was certain he would collapse, that his quaking knees would give out and send his body to the ground in a crumpled heap, that he would lose the consciousness he had managed to hold on to for so long. It hurt more than he remembered, but that was no real oddity considering how long it had been since he had known real, prolonged mortal pain. The real worry was tipping over, succumbing to the lack of physical control and sending his poor ward into even more of a panic.

Yet he did not fall, despite sensing that he was dangerously close to it, which seemed vaguely near to a miracle. When his eyes would focus again, he looked down to see that Lilith had been able to plant her hands and knees to plaster-enforced cement at either side of his shoulders and legs, literally nailing him to the spot. His torso ached where her flesh had collided with it, scattered little injuries, jarred and inflamed, protesting to the treatment. Like an echoed rasp of noise he could hear her stumbled apologies, could feel her attempting to regain better balance and get back to her feet.

But some things raged harder than anguish. He truly didn't want her to move. Reaching out, his trembling hands felt along until they found the slope of her waist and calmly, silently asked her to stay.

She was so close. Close enough to catch a whiff of the flowery scent to her hair. He had been familiar with this smell for over a decade – noticing that the air always seemed fresher when he took a few moments from endless days to check how his child charge was faring. As he had drawn closer to her, the smell had acted in a manner less than innocent; coaxing usually quite stable senses into seeing things that had at first brought a flush of shame to his cheeks. Shame which had so swiftly bloomed into an impassioned longing. Even now, as deeply as he knew her, he still found her smell to be intoxicating, found torn and tired muscles tightening, conflicted between desire and pain.

"Wait," he whispered, damning the shake of his traitorous limbs, he desperately tried to quell the trembling to no avail. He could do this – he_ could._ "Please…" But his legs refused to agree with him, resulting in a wince when his back slid a few inches down the wall.

"You can't wait any longer," she told him gently, lifting one hand tentatively from the wall to touch his cheek, soft fingertips brushing sweat and dust coated skin. "Let's get you inside and into some hot water." Her left arm slipped around his waist and lugged him forward in time to the shove of her key into the lock. The angel almost slid off balance, but he stopped himself this time by quickly propping his forearm against the jam, and in doing so helped take some weight from Lilith's delicate shoulders. Shoving the door open with her foot, bracing against the sturdy wall as did her companion, as she maneuvered Azrael's body through the entryway and over the threshold with an almost unnerving, hefted ease.

Glancing at him, she noticed that a faint smile had touched his battered lips. The corners of his mouth turned up in gentle amusement while he retorted softly, "even like this, you want to see me bare?"

She smiled in return, pulling the door closed behind their backs and fumbling to fix the latch. "Silly, you look perfectly fine."

"Aha, so this is a confession? You like your men dirty and sweaty and bleeding?"

Lilith's fingers closed around his wrist, pulling his right arm over her shoulders again to locate her preferred state of balance and started determinedly toward the bathroom. "_Men?_ I only want one."

His grip on her other hand tightened very slightly, and she looked up to see the color of his eyes had shifted to a dusky blue-violet as they focused wearily on her face. "That's sweet of you to say," he murmured quietly, lush despite the harsh rasp underneath it. The devoted affection carried within his voice caused her heart to thump hard and contentedly against her ribs.

"It's the truth," she stated, almost flippant in her casual reply as she lugged him along, mightily grateful for the assistance of the hallway walls he managed to use as a prop to cushion the weight bearing down on her shoulders. "I'll love you no matter how you insist on abusing yourself."

The bathroom door was open, and Lilith was immediately very thankful she had an apartment with low counters when she flipped the light-switch and illuminated the room with a clean white light and saw them. "Sit here a minute," she indicated the counter to the side of the sink while pivoting on the balls of her feet to give him room to seat himself. He did so, heavily, leaning backward against the mirror and heaving a long, shallow sigh, pain-whitened eyes falling closed. Lilith turned to the bathtub, her manner distinctly businesslike as she turned the water on as hot as it would go. Then she walked back to Azrael, yanking off her jacket and hanging it on one of the towel pegs behind her, examining his intricate, layered clothing. "Did you want to keep these?" she asked him, tugged lightly at the loose edging of the slacks at his knee to make her meaning plain.

Faintly violet eyes slid opened and glanced down at the shirt and slacks. "_Mou_…I'll mend them later. Don't fret about that—just do what you have to."

The lack of polish to his speech no longer surprised her. His pain was undoubtedly enough to render anyone unconcerned with the way they worded things.

She nodded and stepped forward, intent upon her mission to remove the tattered ruins of what had once been (without question) an extraordinarily beautiful outfit. He parted his knees for her to stand between them, the movement jostling a muted, musical ringing from the tiny silver bells hung from three rows of chain decorating the cloth draping his waist. Brushing the delicate silver clasps that held the front of the garment closed at ribs and neck, her fingers settled at the bottom-most silver fastening. Undoing the clasps was relatively easy, they unhooked with little resistance and with the gentle tinkling of bell and chain. As she worked her way up the strange shirt's front, she asked him cordially, "why are there bells?"

"Bit of a joke, actually. You know that little saying that the toll of a bell symbolizes an angel earning his wings?" She nodded. "That's partially why. That and they're a handy aid. Bell magic's fairly strong."

She had undone all but the very last of the clasps; the pair that held closed the high collar circling his neck. Touching her fingertips to the underside of his chin, she told him with silence and contact to tilt his head back. Eyes still trustfully closed, he did so, exposing his throat for her to bare and free from the shirt, then parted his back with the wall for a moment to allow her to peel the fabric from his upper body. She took this chore with the utmost care, parting the folds of cloth very, very slowly so as to avoid aggravating or ripping any of his wounds.

Most of the smaller cuts and scrapes had begun to close and heal, but the larger injuries still sluggishly bled. Lilith winced at the sight, her eyes scanning the angel's bared torso with a mixture of grim sympathy, worry, and shock upon seeing the hitherto almost untouchable creature so badly thrashed. He was a riddled mess of bruises, small scratches, and cuts. Color streaked and bruised the skin around a two-inch long slice cut into the right arm. A series of horrible mincemeat scrapes to the left pectoral and that long, deeply gouged gash just under it, spanning along his side, seemed to be the worst surface injuries she could see.

Yet still she searched, feeling her way along his upper body with surprisingly steady hands and taking a long mental catalogue of damages done to him. The emotion welling inside her felt odd considering the circumstances. She didn't think she was familiar with the cold, empty anger that chilled her gut like ice, but she did know that whoever had been responsible for this was darn lucky she was probably too weak to exact payment for such brutality. Spell or no spell; _someone's_ intent had been behind it.

To her slight surprise, the skin beneath the sore scrapes and blush of trauma was as white as ivory cream. Unlike usual, there was no addition of bronze or pink to mortalize the outward appearance of his pallor, and it was a reminder of just how badly hurt he was to be unable to produce even that small of a glamour. The tips of her fingers following the arced line of his jaw, tracing down the side of his neck and gently smoothing over his collarbone – paying no heed to the soft dampness of his sweat.

As if he had sensed the question left unspoken to avoid obtrusively pestering him, he told her roughly, "wasn't thinking much about appearance factors when coming down…forgot to add tan."

The vibration of his speech made her palm tingle. She lifted her hand to his cheek, tracing the angular curves of his face as she watched him, her affection turned sympathetic and drawn out of pity. "I'm glad. I like the natural color."

A soft smile came to his lips, inspired by the hushed comment. But he just reminded, "the water, darling," and said no more.

With a sharp gasp she whirled about on small feet and leapt for the faucet. Indeed, the tub was full of hot water, just as he'd indicated. Good thing he had been paying attention to the steam rising and fogging up the mirror, because _she_ sure hadn't noticed – she had been too distracted by the godlike beauty her companion possessed. Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing, either...just out of place considering how hurt the poor man was.

Shirt and boots removed without too much trouble, she turned to the task of removing her charge's slacks. They were odd; tight against the rear and loose about the legs, purest white and partially covered with another layer of black fabric embracing each leg. Though they were a puzzle of rips and tears, she could vaguely register how they had been meant to look; slit down the outer sides, laced together with silver cord, and chained to the belt of the slacks. Or something like that. He really did have a beautiful wardrobe, always presenting himself in the loveliest clothes…and he was so brutal to them.

But the problem was getting him _out_ of those pants. There was little chance of him retaining the energy to undress himself, after all he had needed help with the shirt, let alone slacks that looked like a strange meld of western chaps and bondage. At the same time, however, the idea of stripping him further was a delicately uncomfortable one.

"You needn't be shy," he coaxed gently, as if he had interpreted her feeling through the outward glimmer of hesitation. "You have seen me bare before."

"I know, but—" _That was different..._

"I wouldn't ask if I could do it myself. You have to admit it's pathetic when a grown man can't undress himself," the edge of his mouth curved upward with the hint of a smile. "And the bath _was_ your idea."

She scowled and tugged lightly on a lock of his hair. "Yes, yes, thank you." Yet for all her cool outer facade, she stiffened when he pushed himself forward with help from the mirror, bringing his body within a closer range.

A mere moment later found her scolding herself most vividly. He was right after all, she had seen him naked before. He needed her help, and he most _certainly_ needed a bath, so what was so bloody difficult about helping him out of a pair of pants? Absolutely nothing. But her fingers trembled as they rested against the buckle of his belt, shivering as though with cold, even though the flush to her cheeks more than proved the symptom false. The leather came free without much to hold it back, and she released it to undo the single silver button and zipper – as though proving to herself that she wasn't afraid. Oh, but this was _ridiculous!_ She was so much better than this. She was _not_ afraid of her guardian angel; nor was she afraid of the body that had shielded and held her with such love and devotion.

No, not afraid. Just charmingly embarrassed. Right.

He wore nothing underneath his slacks. That became crystal clear while she was examining the situation in attempt to locate the best way to pull the fabric from him and was faced with bare skin rather than the waistband of another layer. She blushed, but somehow managed to keep her voice steady. "Do you think you can stand for me?"

His fingers were on her face, gently caressing the slope of her cheek, his eyes on her expression even though she was pointedly not looking at him, and answered quietly, "for you, precious, anything." He scooted closer to the surface edge, trying his hardest not to grimace when he let his body slide until his feet were planted flat to floor and stood upright. Weary and lacking support, he tipped precariously forward, only to have Lilith catch him around the waist.

"Hold on," she advised, muffled though she was by the decent amount of bare shoulder in front of her mouth, and he obeyed immediately, arms tightly circling her smaller figure. The tips of her fingers tucked under the fabric gathered loose about his hips and tugged, peeling the garment from his body. Heat rushed to her cheeks while the garment loosened and slithered to pool upon floor at their feet...and there he stood, completely naked, clinging to her for support, with his face buried in the crook of her neck and his breath warm against her skin. She cleared her throat and wrapped an arm around his middle, careful both to avoid gripping too low and the dried blood that painted a substantial portion of his left side a garish red. "Here we go, bath-time," she chirped with an almost forced cheer as she helped him approach the tub.

After quickly assessing the level of water, height of the porcelain sides, and Azrael's rapidly weakening reserve of strength; Lilith thought it best to help him into the water via a standing position. Apparently following her judgment, the angel complied by lifting one leg and stepping into the tub. He shook so badly that she was horribly concerned he might lose his balance and fall, but he gripped her shoulders to keep himself upright until he was standing with both feet in the water. Changing her grip to accommodate the new placement, Lilith steadied him, assisting his tired body to slide somewhat awkwardly into a tight sitting position.

A deep, bittersweet sigh of relief pushed between his lips when the hot water embraced him, lapping softly over strained muscle and tired flesh. The heat was soothing, numbing the pain of his injuries, both major and minor. The water in itself acted like a medicine with thanks to the fluorescent orange liquid Pandora had forced him to swallow, for the numerous tiny cuts and scrapes that riddled his body were closing in on themselves – healing completely to leave nothing but tiny patches of dried blood behind as evidence that there had been wounds to begin with. All that was left was the slash to his left side. The flesh which had been ripped because of severe strain to done to his own muscle structure.

The force he had used to throw off Lucifer's spell had pulled the pressure onto his own body for the short breath of a moment. This, combined with the physical force he had been using to back up his magical energy, had concentrated stress in his left side just under the heart and had caused the skin and flesh to rip open. It looked better now then it had previously, as the potion was contributing to a quick healing, but it still looked vicious, and stung when it made contact with the water. Such was the price of a miracle.

Lilith seated herself on the rim of the bathtub, cloth in one hand, which she thoroughly soaked in the water and wrung out. Her empty hand cupped his chin, gently tilting his face upward while she smoothed the damp cloth over his cheeks and forehead, along the sharp bridge of his nose, and down his neck – wiping away the dirt, blood, and sweat that coated his skin. She wet the cloth again and smoothed the fabric over patches of bruised white flesh that were still coated with dust. Once wiped reasonably clean, she took hold of a shallow plastic bowl and dipped up some of the water. "Close your eyes," she murmured, lifting the bowl and pouring the contents straight over his head. The longer strands of hair flattened against his face, pasted to his skin with the wet that washed a generous amount of dirt from the pale tresses. She repeated it once, then twice, smoothing dripping bangs back from his face.

"Does that hurt?" she asked him, pointing to the cut in his side.

"Not as much as it did. I've had worse anyway." He smiled wryly, "I have worse _now_."

Turning where she sat, she toed open the cabinet under the sink and dug around a stock of toilet paper for the bottle of peroxide. He didn't ask what she was doing while she unscrewed the cap, merely turned slightly, bracing his hands against the sides of the bath to give her better access to the ugly scarlet graze she was so obviously eager to treat. The nod of thanks preceded the rather graceless upturn of half the bottle.

The hiss that clawed its way through gritted teeth was a hard noise of profanity uttered in a language completely alien to her ears, his pale head turning determinedly away while the disinfectant burned through the open cut, shattering the clotted surface and forcing into his bloodstream. A fresh trickle of crimson slid like a vibrant tear along his stomach, a red trail from wound to water. She was apologizing. He could hear her voice lifted in words that he wasn't really hearing through the sharp, mindless pain of it. It blazed fiercely through his senses, jolting the spoken syllables in and out of focus, hot and icy and jolting all at once.

But the stinging agony died almost instantly, dulling into a mediocre numbness that throbbed like the after-kiss of ice and bid his tight-wound body to relax. The echoes of Lilith's voice found sensitive ears, cuing the touch of a finger to press lightly to her lips. "Shh," he hushed her in a hollowed, mellow tone, "it's all right. It needed to be done and it's numb now anyways." He allowed tired fingers brush against her cheek, twining in the soft, nut-brown hair that had escaped from her ponytail and now hung limp and steam-damp about her face. "You think I've never known pain before?"

She didn't answer the question so obviously _not_ meant to be answered. In silence she fought back the reaction she wanted to give to his hurt. The expression of anguish that had struck his face like lightening had reminded her of the deep-set loathing she had to seeing someone she loved suffer and finding herself unable to do anything about it. It had made her want to go to utter pieces and cry, or seriously beat the tar out of some demon. He continued with his explanation, the weariness in his voice countered by the clear cut effort he was pouring into helping her understand, and she listened without interrupting, merely staring guiltily down at the hands clasped tightly in her lap.

"During the French Revolution I had the unfortunate joy of getting myself stabbed in the leg with a rather irate woman's kitchen knife. In the American Civil War, I was shot to the hip and the bullet shattered the bone. World War II though, I think, gave me the worst." He pondered with a quiet survey of whatever his expansive memory showed him and added genially; "I was acting as a lieutenant general in the fourth Brigade of Britain's Cavalry. Wound up with…let's see, bullet to the arm, knife through the hand and again just missing the left kidney, both kneecaps broken, one leg broken, both Achilles tendons cut, and my right shoulder pulled out of socket."

He nodded; satisfied that he had remembered everything, the smile at his lips both wry and bemused. "Oh, and my throat was slit by pirates once. But it was actually quite funny to see their faces when I refused to die." A soft chuckle coaxed her into looking up at him, green eyes wide with an uncertain surprise. Azrael smiled at her, and chucked her gently under the chin while he murmured, "I'm no stranger to pain. It's just been a long time since I've felt mortal hurt. I'm not used to it."

She found that she rather admired the casual approach he took in regards to his history of being mauled by various weapons in a variety of settings. She couldn't even imagine having both her Achilles tendons cut…her ankles were sensitive and she'd never liked having them touched, even by the experts she went to for pointe shoe fittings. But to have them cut, sliced in half by a knife? While _conscious?_ She shuddered at the thought; more affected by the idea of something cutting through her ankles then even her vulnerable throat. The pain alone would have been tremendous – and then the indignity, not able to walk for the pain and the loss of blood. Bless him for being able to talk about it so easily.

He stretched cautiously, smoothly suppressing a wince when one shoulder joint jarred and popped as he draped his arm over the side of the tub. Lilith's observant eyes traced the angle of that arm, following up and over his shoulder to the pale back resting against the tiled shower wall, her brain processing information and whim and fact like a whirlwind. The muscles in his torso looked tight and uncomfortable; Pandora had said that he's pulled and strained many. Whenever she pulled a muscle there were two things she did for it – heat and pressure. Heat, he had. But pressure...

She bit her lip, flushing against a remnant of girlish sensitivity. It wasn't as though she had never been unclothed in his presence, after all she had slept with him, let him touch her. Besides, she really did need to get _rid_ of such unnecessary shyness. Right, well, that settled the matter. She stood; turning her back to him and yanking the tie out of her hair before whipping it back up into a careless, sloppy knot high at the back of her head. Tucking her fingers underneath the hem of her lightweight sweater, she pulled the garment up, over her head and tossed it to the floor.

"Lilith," Azrael's voice was mild, politely puzzled, "what're you doing?"

The question went ignored, passed cleanly over by embarrassed hands sending work slacks to the floor, kicking off her shoes as she did so. His eyes were on her, she could feel the pierce of his gaze upon her back while she unhooked the fastenings of her bra and dropped it. Knowing that he was there (and what she was doing) brought heat to her cheeks, as well as a tiny tremor of anxiety to her stomach-inhabiting flock of butterflies…but she finished. Almost defiantly, she pushed her underwear down off her hips and kicked them across the laminate floor to crown the small pile of discarded clothing. She was nothing but composed when she turned back to approach the bathtub, apparently oblivious to the warmth of the angel's eyes flickering down her bare body.

"Scoot," she muttered, gently pushing at his shoulder, motioning that he should move forward to make room for her. Without question, he did so, pushing himself toward the faucet and bending his knees, allowing her to slide into the hot water behind him. It was her back resting against the tiled wall now, kneeling, a little cramped upon the bathtub floor, and it was her hands taking gentle hold of his shoulders. Surely it was her. Who else could it be, even despite such an uncharacteristic display of nudity? Obeying the touch of her hands, Azrael let her guide him backward, tucking himself closer to her chest.

She was warm; the heat of her naked flesh pressed flush to his back and her thighs cradling his sides, cushioning the hard slope of the large porcelain basin. The position was so openly intimate that he wondered faintly if she knew how suggestive she was acting; yet surely she did if she had gone as far as to remove her underclothing before joining him. Part of him was suddenly very annoyed that he wasn't at his best physically. In other circumstances, he would have welcomed the situation immensely.

Wouldn't any man?

Lilith lowered her hands to the water, wetting them with a light splish as she surveyed the expanse of Azrael's lean, muscular back. The black, scrolling lines that represented his wings in resting form reminded her of a wrought-iron fence she had seen once; a beautiful thing with delicate traceries of vines and flowers within the sturdy framework. It was artwork imbedded in his flesh, yet his shoulders were tense and knotted with strain. Tightness exposed by a loss of honed outward control, the tendon and sinew looked sore and uncomfortable underneath the white of the tattooed skin. She would start there.

Laying her palms on the curve between shoulders and neck, she pressed the heels of her hands into the muscle, thumbs circling against his upper back. For an instant Azrael stiffened, surprised, and then he completely relaxed, sinking back into the touch of her hands and wrestling a soft smile from his ward. She rubbed in varied intervals, spanning between soft and hard increments of pressure to work the tension from the angel's tired body, easing stress and convincing his muscles to relax. It gave her pleasure to help him, to know that he was safe and well in her arms, that he wasn't suffering somewhere beyond her reach anymore. It was also rather endearing to hear him purr like a happy cat.

"_Mmm,_" he sighed, resting his head against her shoulder. She shifted to accommodate him without dislocating her own arm, the reach of her palms slipping down to work at his lower back and flush the tightness out with pressure. A touch of warm breath fanned against her skin when he turned his face into her neck, brushing a delicate kiss to her throat while he whispered, "I love you."

"I love you too," she replied, turning her head to meet his lips with her mouth – a gentle kiss, soft and slow and full of feeling. She shook her head, clearing her throat before telling herself, "I should get you to bed. You need to rest." She began to reach over him for the stopper that held the water in, but he caught her hand with a shaky slide of wet fingers.

"Wait," he said softly, slipping his fingers between hers to hold her hand. "Just for a little while, please?" The resonance of his voice softened until it was barely a whisper, his eyes flickering closed to block blue-violet irises from view as he leaned back into her embrace, cuddled like an overlarge child against her chest.

She might have protested, might have said that he had been active enough and he needed to sleep…but the harder she tried to justify that excuse to herself, the more difficult it was to speak. What had he done, after all? Torn his own body to shreds in order to help the planet, to save the earth from ripping itself apart, saving the lives of every one of the mortals living there. He had earned peace and rest, and did she have the heart to deny him what he wanted? No, she didn't. So she complied, wrapping her free arm around his waist to hold him. There they stayed until the temperature faded to lukewarm: Azrael's back pressed to Lilith's torso, his face nestled into the curve of her neck, their fingers intertwined. Peace of a kind that might only be found in the company and arms of another.

When the water grew cold, Lilith rose determinedly from the tub, leaving Azrael for a moment to she hunted for clean clothes. She hurriedly dressed herself in a pair of fleece pants and a soft sweater, pulling on a thick pair of socks while she searched for something that would fit her temporary roommate. The problem was that she owned nothing even remotely close to his size – all of her shirts were too small, and all of her pants wouldn't have made it passed his thighs let alone being _long_ enough in the leg. So she made a mental note to go out and purchase some things for him later. Until then, an overload of blankets would have to do.

Dragging a fresh, fluffy towel from the linen closet, she made her way back to the bathroom to find that Azrael had pulled the stopper and drained the water for her in her absence. He had even managed to pull himself upright to sit on the rim of the tub, though he looked worse for it, and earned a scolding reminder that he was supposed to be taking it easy to which she received a tired smile and a halfhearted nod. Sympathy and affection warm in her heart, she wrapped him in the towel and helped him limp into the bedroom, deciding it wasn't worth making too much of an issue.

He fell into slumber only moments after being tucked under the covers, his hair and skin still slightly damp and a thick bandage padding the cut in his side. Lilith smiled down at him when she returned from the kitchen bearing another warm wool blanket and a glass of water to find her temporary charge sound asleep. Placing the water on the bedside table in case he woke with thirst, she wrapped herself in the soft knit of the spare blanket and curled up in the chair by the covered window, content to sleep there.

She closed her eyes, tucking her feet under the blanket while hugging her knees to her chest. Secretly, she was glad to have him there, glad he was banned from fighting and war for a few days while recovery healed and cared for superficial injuries. Even more secretly, however, she dreaded the day when he would have to leave her to return to it. The day she knew would have to come.

* * *

**Bet no one saw that coming. Sarcasm sarcasm. Long-ass chapter, so I'll leave it there for now and skive off the lame, useless author-commentary. Sorry this update took so long, btw...Life came out of nowhere and smacked me right across the face. I suddenly found myself unbelievably busy. But I won't bore you with details XD  
**

**Please, please remember to review!! **

**:) until next time!**


	43. Beauty is Within us

**Chapter 61: Beauty is Within Us**

Recommended Listening: "Coffey on the Mile" by Thomas Newman [from The Green Mile]"Beauty is Within Us" by Yoko Kanno [From Ghost in the Shell]

* * *

Lilith couldn't remember the last time she'd had so much fun while shopping. Normally, it was one of her least favorite activities; disliking the time and energy it took to find, try on, and purchase clothing for herself – underwear the very least of all. It was tedious, rather boring and, on occasion, highly embarrassing. Though she could usually count on coming out pleased with whatever purchases she made, she detested the insane amount of time it took to find anything worth spending her hard-earned money on. That morning, however, she found it was an entirely different story. Apparently the experience was much different when the shopping was for someone else.

The modest number of boutiques and shops she visited for herself would have been no help to her on this particular mission, being suited mainly to the needs of women. Yet she managed to stumble her way across a quaint, convenient store – out of the way somewhere she doubted she would ever be able to find again – and happened upon an extremely helpful older gentleman who greeted her with a warm smile and an inquiry as to what she was looking for. Telling him that she was buying for an adult male in his late twenties, she was given another, somewhat knowing, smile and was led off to a section of the shop lined with racks and rows of more items of clothing than she could take in at once. According to the salesman, whatever she might need could be found here; and upon noticing another customer, he left her to browse, insisting that she let him know if she needed any help.

Initially she was unsure how to begin. Realizing that she hadn't bothered to ask Azrael for his sizes, she wondered whether or not to go back and ask him. Another second later and she was grabbing the nearest pair of pants and holding them up to her own hips to guesstimate, using her memory of him against her own size, and finding it almost embarrassingly easy to remember the contrast between them. She knew exactly how much larger, wider, and longer his body was to her own – which wasn't at _all _odd. Calculating the differences between male and female size-numbers used by that particular shop, Lilith came to the conclusion that it wouldn't be too difficult to find one or two things for him.

As she began to paw through the racks, she was pleasantly surprised to find an array of very distinctly tasteful, interesting styles offered. She pulled a few things out to examine them…rejecting some and keeping a few, pondering colors and cuts and keeping in mind that her partner was long in the torso. It was actually very easy (and amazingly enough, entertaining). Perusing the selections, she tossed her chosen items over her arm before she collected so many that a basket was required.

She supposed the span of success was partly due to the fact that she didn't have to fret about picking something Azrael wouldn't like or wear. He had a distinct sense of style, but it wasn't terribly difficult to catch and tailor to it. He always seemed to be wearing something pretty, something that complimented his fair features; gently flamboyant with interesting fabrics, darks and lights intermingled with color and pattern all in wrapped up together. The man had good taste.

She left the store a little less than an hour later, several good-sized bags clutched in her arms and a light blush turning her cheeks pink. Her not-so-small pile of chosen garments had earned her a curious glance from the salesman, but when he discovered the underclothing folded inside the mound (which she had selected on an uncertain whim) a grin that could only be described as wicked pulled at the older man's mouth. He didn't question, didn't say anything at all, yet the implied gusto with which he scanned and bagged her items made her want to crawl into a corner and burn up with the heat of her own embarrassment. Even this little discomfort, however, could not dissuade the enjoyment and success of the trip, and she trotted back homeward feeling very pleased with herself.

Slipping off her shoes in the entryway, she padded into the bedroom – intending to check on her patient – and dumped her bags on the floor as quietly as she could manage before casting her gaze toward the bed. He seemed to be as fast asleep as when she had left a little while ago; lying on his side with a pillow hugged against his chest, the blankets pulled high under his chin, his body curled as though he were trying to keep warm. When she sat down on the edge of the mattress, the assumption that her partner was fast asleep was proven quickly false as his eyes slid open. Alert as ever; not asleep at all, but waiting.

She smiled at him, reaching out to tuck a thread of hair out of his eyes before bending to kiss his cheek. "How're you feeling?" The inquiry was soft, divided by attention focused on carefully examining his expression to try and locate any sign of pain.

Stretching like a cat, he let out a quiet sigh and returned her smile. "Certainly better than last night. Most of the pain is only a memory, though my lung still feels a bit tender…and this damn cut has not yet closed up," he shook back the blankets to indicate the damaged half of his torso. The nasty gash was still tidily bandaged, but the skin exposed looked raw, scraped, and painful. "I feel a bit weak in the limbs," he added thoughtfully, assessing his own state of wellbeing with a few experimental adjustments. "The rest helped, though it is strange to sleep alone now. A pillow just does not replace someone's warmth."

Well, that was certainly flattering. She had to viciously beat back a wide, silly grin of pleasure in favor of replying with a soft touch to his hand as she asked, "feel up to a bit of breakfast?"

"_Mou_…" he smiled rather sheepishly, sweeping his bangs back from his face to answer, "I do not think I have ever been this hungry in my life."

She tilted her head to one side, slightly puzzled. "I thought you didn't _need_ to eat." She had determined that Pandora's order was in regards to how well the medicine went down and to banish the taste…not because he'd be _hungry_.

"You would be right if I was in control of the body I'm occupying."

She still looked confused, if not more so.

He laughed, and then launched into cheerful explanation. "When I take my human form normally, I have complete control over it. The fact that I am an immortal and have no need of nourishment transfers to that body because my mental-power and instincts have the ability to override that sort of basic human requirement," he paused momentarily to make certain that she was following, "but because of the amount of power and energy I used, I put my immortal control into a short bit of trauma. So…I am still immortal, but my body requires a bit of a boost to get back into its proper place while my instincts kick back up." At this point, his stomach gave a loud, protesting demand for food, growling insistently like a caged lion. Sighing, he added meekly, obviously frustrated by his own body's refusal to behave, "I really am rather famished."

Unable to help herself, she giggled, clapping her hands over her mouth when he shot her an over-exaggeratedly wounded look. It only made her laughter intensify, strengthened by the sulky-puppy worthy pout adorning his handsome face. "Well if you can stand a few more minutes, I'll go make you something," she managed to tell him despite a mild shortage of breath. He still appeared somewhat miffed with her as she stood, even with the promise of getting fed – a look which only darkened when she reached out to tousle his hair with a fond hand. "You are too cute," was her matter-of-fact claim, given on her way to find him something to eat.

She dodged when Azrael attempted a playful swat to her departing bottom, exiting the room nearly beside herself with laughter, faintly able to hear muttered remarks of: _cruel_ and _cute, hah!_ But despite his pretense at seeming irritated, she knew the angel's mood was far from annoyance. He was merely playing along with her, taking cheer from her shopping-induced good mood.

Speaking of shopping, she would have to remember and ask him if he wanted to get dressed. He had made an implication that he was cold; maybe getting him in something other than his bare skin would help. Because while she wouldn't have complained otherwise, she just didn't think it would be wise to share a bed again just yet – even if her original intention would be to keep him warm. As unpredictable as their intimacy often was, she didn't want him getting carried away with his rapidly regenerating strength and pushing himself too hard. No doubt he would if she gave him so much as an inch.

Sighing, she shook her head as she located a carton of eggs and a package of bacon inside a drawer of the fridge. _Lucky me,_ she groused silently, sinking into the pattern of a cooking-dance, _I have to go and pick a man who's as tenaciously passionate as they come. _Of course, it didn't help that he could probably charm her into who knew what. All he had to do was say her name in that breathy, slurring way he was fond of using to make her joints go all watery and he'd have her right in the palm of his hand again.

Ah, the joys of infatuation were often brutal. Brutal truths that tasted like chocolate and smelled of spices.

* * *

Lilith was amused. There was simply no other way to say it; she was purely and utterly…amused.

It had been one thing to see him half-dead, blue around the eyes and lips and spewing his medicine all over the wall of a tent. Witnessing that had torn at her heartstrings like a serrated knife. But it was a completely different story this time, watching him choke down another quart of the vividly orange and slightly bitter-smelling stuff that Pandora had sent home with him. It was downright comical. He swallowed, gagged, swore, and swallowed some more…yet while he hissed profanity in a manner that would have offended even the foulest-mouthed sailor (and in around five different languages, too), he drank it all. Down to the last drop. Just as he'd been told.

After handing the empty medicine container back to her – nose wrinkled and lips pursed with distaste – Azrael turned his attention to the tray of scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, sliced apple and orange juice being slid across his lap. Eyes considerably wide, he looked back up at her with mild surprise. "Am I supposed to eat _all_ of this?"

"Yes," she answered simply. Though she once would have been surprised at his question, she didn't think much of it now. She figured that since he didn't usually eat out of need, he probably wasn't accustomed to having such a large quantity of food only for himself…and she had provided quite a bit. The tray contained more than double the portion that she had loaded onto her own plate, which she quite cheerfully dug into. "Look at you!" she pointed with the end of her egg-laden fork to indicate his body type. "You're not a built like a rock or anything, but you're in a grown man's body and you need the fuel to provide for it."

He glanced back down at his eggs, still looking stunned. "But I—"

"Oh, hush up and eat!" she ordered impatiently, "or I'll tie you to the bed and _make_ you!"

As soon as the words left her mouth, a grin carved from nothing but pure wickedness tugged at the corner of his mouth, lilac eyes flushing with a light blue to indicate affectionate interest. Yet he did as she bid him to, taking up his fork and scooping a bite of egg. Sure enough, within a few more minutes, the tray was laden with nothing but empty dishes and Azrael's posture had relaxed into the pillows with a distinctly satisfied, if somewhat embarrassed, smile.

"See?" Lilith gently tugged at a lock of his hair, sliding her own dishes onto the tray taken from his lap and settled on the floor shoved out of the way. "I told you you'd need it."

His laughter was gentle, nodding his assent while she went to the window and pulled back the curtains – letting the light from outside shine in. The day was cloudy, but pleasant enough in that cold, gray winter way. "And it tasted wonderful. You, madam, are a good cook."

Lilith rolled her eyes at him. "Oh sure. I'm pretty positive you could do much better than burnt toast and watery eggs."

"Actually, I have no talent for cooking," he stated calmly. "I seem to remember causing the last human I cooked for to go into a bought of very violent vomiting. Camp food or no…" A grimace interrupted him, one palm shifting to rest against his bandaged cut. "The kitchen and I were not meant to be business partners."

Unable to resist, she all but beamed at him from across the room while en route to the bathroom to grab a fresh roll of bandaging and a pair of scissors. "A_ha! _So there _is_ something even you can't do? After all this time I was starting to wonder if I was ever going to find anything!" He quirked an eyebrow, but a smile was its only accompaniment as she returned with her mind set to treating the rest of his visible injuries. "Here, let's take a look at that—"

Bending over his torso, she slid the end of the steel-made scissors under the tight band of gauze holding the bandage in place and neatly sliced it apart. Very carefully, so as not to rip the clotting surface, she peeled back the pad of cloth – wincing as, despite her efforts, small spots under the scab began to bleed anew. Azrael didn't seem pained by it. His face was impassive and calm as he watched her. Of course, now that she thought about it, this little cut would be _nothing_ compared to having both Achilles tendons sliced-through. Lilith suppressed a shudder and tossed the old gauze and cloth aside into the wastebasket, quickly pressing a fresh, sterile pad over the oozing gash and instructing, "hold that down?" The angel did as she bid him, securing his palm atop the pad as she pulled her hand away.

Winding a new roll of gauze around him was a bit trickier. In the end, he had to support himself by holding onto the headboard, squeezing some space between pillows and back for her to bind the bandaging tight to his torso. The majority of his arm strength had returned to him, so the feat was a relatively easy one considering that, because of his lung, he couldn't make himself sit up...which would have been simpler. Once the gauze was wrapped and secured, he let his body relax against the bed again, pulling the covers back over his bare shoulders and glancing expectantly up at his keeper as if to say, _what next?_

The active search for warmth failed to escape Lilith's watchful eyes. With the use of a thumb jerked over her shoulder toward her bags as she cleared away her mess, she asked him: "Do you want to get dressed? I got some things for you—"

His violet gaze shifted to peer over the foot of the bed, trained to the small mound of shopping which had gone unnoticed earlier, and was just able to restrain a visible reaction of astonishment. "I know for a fact that you are less than fond of purchasing clothing," he stated with a forced sort of calm. "What happened?"

"Oh!" She had the decency to blush. "Well, I figured I'd have to anyway because nothing of mine would fit you. But once I actually started looking it was kind of fun." Her smile was rather guilty, full of reminiscence about the salesman's sly, knowing looks. "Canceling out the underwear part." Shrugging off the minor discomfort, she scooped up one of the bags (placed strategically on top of the pile) before plopping enthusiastically on the bed next to her patient, crossing her legs before her. She dropped it into his lap, looking for all the world like a little girl sharing a bundle of priceless treasures unearthed from the back garden…or somewhere equally, ordinarily strange.

Deciding against voicing his bemusement; he pulled a simple white cotton t-shirt and a set of flannel pajamas from the plastic case. The laughter that burst from his throat upon closer examination nearly choked him. Soft lavender flannel patterned with fluffy white sheep bouncing over and among silvery clouds...amusement didn't even begin to cover the extent of the mirth filling him up like helium. "Sheep, darling?" he managed to gasp before succumbing to a helpless fit of laughter, throwing back his head in a loud declaration of hilarity.

"_Real_ men wear sheep," came Lilith's cross insistence, acting as though she was insulted when, in truth, she didn't mind. She liked his laughter. She had since the very first time she'd heard it. Still, she pouted, her mood driven to tease simply out of relief that there was no longer any blue to her injured angel's lips.

Azrael's laughter gentled – his arm snagging her about the waist and pulling her toward him, making it possible to press a soft kiss against her forehead. "I could not tell you why," he informed her, swiping a thread of hair escaped her ponytail behind her ear, "but I like them."

The way she beamed up at him, so bright and rosy, all trace of the pout gone, made it worth accepting the gift. Truthfully, something about the happily cloud-bouncing sheep entertained him. Perhaps it was simply the fact that Lilith had bought them, or perhaps that had nothing to do with it; either way he didn't really care. His masculinity was not in jeopardy here, not that it ever really was. Just the look that would cross Beelzebub's face if he saw his friend walking around in sheep-pajamas was enough to make him want to wear the things everywhere he went.

"Will you help me dress?"

Taking the clothing from him, she set the garments down on the carpet and pulled the covers back, allowing him to swing his legs over the side. Using the headboard and the bedside table for support, he stood – steady as could be, though she knew it took him a great deal of effort to do so. Lilith took the pair of pants and arranged the fabric so that he could step into them, nudging both feet through the leg holes, then pulled the waistband up to his hips. Gripping him by the elbows, she helped him situate himself back onto the bed, holding the t-shirt out while he slid his arms through the sleeves so it could be drawn downward to cover his torso.

"Do you need anything else?" she chirped, fussing idly with smoothing his covers as she did so. "Or would you like some more sleep?"

Eyes soft upon her face, Azrael granted her a gentle smile and patted the side of the bed that would have been hers. "What I would really like is some company," he murmured with a hopeful appeal to her affectionate side.

Though she had told herself earlier joining him in bed might be a bad idea, she knew by looking at him that he wouldn't push himself to do anything overtly strenuous. His current state would barely allow him to stand for more than a few moments at most, and that was with _help._ For all his eccentricities, Azrael was not a fool. He knew he couldn't push it, so he wouldn't try – and if he did, she was fairly sure she could keep her head enough to remind him that he lacked the strength to dress himself. Or she could physically subdue him if she had to. Besides, she missed the warmth of contact; his gentle touches and doting smiles, the feel of his breath at her cheek. So she very happily obliged him – stripping herself of jeans and sweater – and slid under the covers beside her patient.

Hesitation gripped her for a moment as she settled, lying, strictly controlled, with a good forced inch between flesh and flesh. What she really wanted to do was wrap herself around him and take comfort in touch…but that was sure to aggravate his cut and lungs—

"It's alright, love," he spoke, snaring the hem of her shirt with a pair of fingers and lightly tugging. "You will not hurt me."

Slightly taken-aback by his sharp intuition, Lilith took a shy breath and did just as she'd wanted to. Scooting closer in order to slip her arms high around his waist to avoid his healing wound, she felt him shift to accommodate her. His legs twined with hers as his hand tucked under her to rest against the slope of her lower back, torso tilted to give her somewhere to press her cheek. With a satisfied sigh, she relaxed, nuzzling her face into his shirt and scent, filling herself with the signs of life inside his material body. "I was scared for you, you know."

The hand at her back twitched: a controlled reaction of surprise. "Why? I am immortal, Sweet, I cannot die. You know that."

"I know, I know," was her hasty reply. "It's just…I don't like seeing you in pain and weaker than a newborn kitten."

"Aha, is that a nickname I see for my future?"

The slap of her palm against his shoulder rang like a shallow whip crack, the force lethally to the point even despite her conscious effort to soften the actual blow. She was not amused...though in part, she was glad for his humor, for somehow the light in his mood made the dark in her that much easier to bear. Steady and supportive, he had always been her rock to cuddle and cling to. "That is _not_ funny," she scolded while burying her face in his other shoulder.

"Forgive me," he pressed his lips to her forehead, smoothing her hair in long, apologetic strokes meant to reassure, fingers combing through the thick dark strands pulled from a ponytail to fall around their shoulders. "But I am fine, Lilith. I will heal." Turning his head, he brushed his cheek against the crown of her head. "The pain was worth it anyway."

"Worth what?"

His smile was wry, tinged with a mixture of irony and a sort of vengeful grievance. "The spell I broke was one intended to destroy the planet. And, in retrospect, everyone and everything on it as well." A humorless laugh jostled the words used when he added, "truthfully, I jumped in for a purely selfish reason. You were here so I knew I had to do it."

She blinked once, tilting her head back to get a better look at his face, her eyes containing a hint of awe mingled with dread. "That was close..." Raw, cold rationality cut off her reflection as efficiently as being elbowed right in the diaphragm, and all of a sudden she felt almost lightheaded. Only then had she realized just how close she had come to feeling true, real death in all its immovable, unrivaled glory. And not the glory she looked in the eyes as her chosen partner. The glory that had half-drowned her without so much as a flinch to prove any connection to human feeling. The glory that kissed the heat from blood and flesh as easily as a breath of air could nourish life; it was a part of him she still feared. She had been so close to that ice-hard mercy, and she hadn't even known. No one had. "I never thought it would be so easy to die..."

The angel took her a firm grip on her chin and urged her to look up into his eyes. Violet had fused with a red flush, creating a burgundy of dark and terrible beauty – the color of defiance, pride, and fury. But he wasn't actually angry with her; a truth she knew without knowing. "Nothing is going to happen to you," he told her, his vehemence bordered on the edge of command, sparkling with the faintest traces of compulsive energy. "I _refuse_ to let you go." But he gasped, the still raw tissue of his injured lung raked by the harshness of his claim, and pressed his palm flat against his chest in an attempt to counter and confine the flash of hurt. "It would kill me."

Reacting immediately to his show of pain, Lilith urged him to lie down, which he did without protest, his fingers twisting around her thumb, almost desperate in his drive to keep some part of her skin to his own. She sat with his head cradled on her lap, unoccupied hand stroking his silky hair. "Don't be silly," she murmured, trying not to let the disturbance she felt gnawing at her insides, reacting instinctively to the ominous edge to what he told her. "You just said it yourself, you can't die—"

"Perhaps not," was his admittance, "but losing you _would_ kill me."

With a shake of her head, she carried his hand to her lips, gently kissing his white knuckles and smoothing her cheek over the back of a hand riddled with tiny iridescent scars. "I'm not going anywhere," she informed him softly. "_I_ refuse to die."

If nothing else, it made him smile. His eyes flickered open and met her bright green ones; the mix of gratitude, love, and peace wrapped up in his expression thumping within her heart's beat, sustenance on par with blood. Taking a graceful hint that the conversation was closed under her opinion and authority, he changed the subject, loathe for their time together to be shadowed by an angle made of grief. "I think," he mused, tone light and unobtrusive, "you wanted to ask me something about my war experience...?"

The prompt was obvious, but she took it, glad to swing her mental grip around. "Yes, I did," she admitted with a small laugh, recalling the numerous times she had run into threads of the angel's past dealings with warfare and military relations. "How many have you been involved in?"

"Almost all of them, mortal and immortal."

"_All—?"_

His interruption came before she could get gather enough fuel to get a good yelp going. "Think about it; people die in wars. I am present anyway, so I might as well involve myself in ways that can make more of a dynamic difference."

"But that's for _humans_…you can't possibly be serious when you say—"

"There have been three full-scale immortal wars," he interjected, ever-patiently launching into an explanation, abbreviated for the sake of the point he wanted to make, never one to over-glorify divine history. "The first: when Lucifel the Morningstar chose to challenge God's rule, which ended in the division of the two immortal realms, as you know. Lucifel was thrown from the heavens by Michael, stripped of his birth-given name and his wings. The second: when the mortal realms became so congested with demons that the angels were sent to erase their inhabitance. This began the checks-and-balances system we have now; which makes it so that no agent of hell may cross the border into the mortal dominion without prior reason, license or leave, else punishment will be given. Of course, the plagues and the fall of Egypt did not stop them forever."

Azrael sighed and let his eyes flutter closed. The annoyance clouding his aura seemed to reflect a wave of foolishness directed toward the event, as if he felt it had been wasteful. Then again, he always seemed to exude a sense of distaste for conflict. "The third war started so soon after the second that it is almost impossible to tell where one ceased and the other began. The third war was a collective rebellion of hell's people against the check system, testing the Almighty's resolve toward the proposals made. It caused unnecessary violence that ended with the fall of Rome."

She wasn't surprised by the rough storytelling, nor the events that had occurred because of the cataclysmic feud between the two immortal realms, hard as it was to wrap her brain around the hint of divine politics being the underlying cause of periods in ancient human history. Instead, she focused on the one base question still grinding into the back of her cranium. "Yes, but that doesn't explain why _you_ were involved. I can understand the part about mortal deaths and whatnot, but surely you aren't needed for an immortal war where no one dies!"

"Ah, my dearest," his empty hand gently ruffled her hair, his eyes sparkling with affectionate amusement, "you and your questions. No! No apologies, I do not mind." She shut her mouth, cutting off her kneejerk apology for pressing so much and allowing him to continue. "You have to remember what I am. Sixth-born child to the Almighty—a soldier to God. We all are. I just happen to be a seraph, which gives me high rank." His smile turned teasing. "You might not think it to look at me. I am not what most would deem the fighter type, not like Gabriel…or Michael."

She felt the slight contraction of the muscle in his arms and shoulders, a tiny, almost untraceable tick of the sort that tended to lead back to a direct source. Something about what he had just said irked him immensely. Slowly, as close to word-for-word as she could get, she retraced his little speech, searching for the cause of the sudden stiffness drawing his back into a rigid plank. It came to her more quickly than she expected.

There had been a chance meeting – back when Azrael had still been gallantly courting her – with the prince of hell that stood out in her mind, dredged from the depths of conscious memory by the reel of need. Beelzebub had asked Azrael something about a _big brother,_ and the angel's response had been all stiff words and a face like a storm cloud. She could remember her confusion; the swift mood shift from deadly to downright cheerful once the subject had been changed had thrown her off-guard at the time. Presently, the uncomfortable tension was a little more subtle. Still, she hoped her question wouldn't nudge him into becoming stony and unresponsive (as some tender subjects did).

"You don't like Michael much, do you?"

Azrael's hand flexed against her knee, where it rested, and the forced remnants of his smile faded into a thin, grim line. At first he didn't answer, and she was devastatingly close to positive she'd just sent him head-first into a session of brooding. Yet when, not a full minute later, he very quietly murmured, "what gave you that impression?" it was neither accusatory nor disapproving, but thoughtful. In fact, he almost seemed grateful she had noticed.

"The way you talk about him," she reasoned, hushed though her voice was. "The two of you don't seem to be very close."

"Ah," he gave a nod to display understanding. "No, we are not close at all. We have not been since Lucifer's rebellion." His brow furrowed slightly while he corrected, "no…that is incorrect. We were having a rough time long before then; it just escalated when he was appointed to throw the disloyal Morningstar from the heavens while the rest of us took on those who chose to follow the devil-to-be. That was when he started behaving as though he ruled the universe, that he was God's favorite—" His fingers twitched, "which is purely his imagination. We managed to get along well enough after that, I just ignored his arrogance. It was when you came along that we…fell apart."

Lilith's eyes widened, utterly horrified. "What are you saying? It's my fault that you and he—"

"No!" Azrael sat up so fast that he made himself choke upon a cry of pain spurred by the searing in his ribs. On automatic instinct she gripped his shoulders, pulling him back down just in time to see him clap a hand over the bandaged slice in his torso. All the same, the momentary distraction did little to delay him from rebuking her assumption, paying no further heed to any hurt that lingered. "Holy heaven, _no!_ You think I blame _you_ for…" The disheveled vehemence constricting his tone slowed, gentled, eased into a thoughtful analysis of truth. Quiet as glass, still as silence, the angel sank into deliberation, searching himself for a way to weave words into the foundation of the relationship between himself and Heaven's Warrior Archangel. "He merely—how should I say it..." He tapped the bandage with long, snow-pale fingers. "He does not approve of my attachment to you. I believe that says it best."

Combing her fingers through his pale bangs, she said nothing, merely waited for more of the explanation she was sure would be coming. One of the first things she had noticed while gathering familiarity with him was his apparently involuntary tendency to speak in riddles. His musical voice rose and fell with lilting, poetic freedom, yet often left her guessing about the real meaning behind the words he used. She had been warned more than once that dealing with one of the seraphim could be irksome, that she may have to coax any in-depth explanations out of her guardian – but Lilith knew that by accepting him as a companion, she had risen to the challenge.

Unlike a few previous occasions, however, this time didn't seem to require a push to get him talking. To Lilith, it seemed that he had been carrying this particular emotional burden for a substantial amount of time without relief and needed to lift it from his chest. Vaguely she wondered why none of his siblings had been sufficient to serve as his listener, though perhaps any angel would be too involved with both parties to make it comfortable for either. As an unrelated, outside source, she was more than willing to be an ear for him.

"The fault is with me, primarily," he confessed, "I should not have taken the bait. It should have been obvious he was trying to push me out of shape, but when he sauntered up as if he owned the entire realm and told me to—" The hushed humming notes of his voice trickled into silence for a brief, thoughtful moment, leaving stillness where his cheek rested at her thigh. That was when he lifted both hands, touching the callused tips of index and middle fingers flat to her temples, spanning her eyes, and said softly, "let me show you."

Her sight faded into a blackened emptiness, startling her into blinking as rapidly as she could in an attempt to clear out the dark. Once clear that the occurrence was intended and to be expected (given the lack of response from the angel responsible), she calmed and waited for something to happen...which wasn't long at all. The blackness flared into white. A brilliant screen of bright, colorless space stretched across the parody of her vision just before a picture whirled into focus in front of her – almost as though being played by a projector onto a movie screen, viewing the scene reenacted from an observer's point of view.

'_O mother dear, look what you've done to your forlorn and once beloved son…why was I born at all?_

The angel turned, the folds of his cloak swirling around his heels like a swatch of the midnight sky glittering gently with silver stars draped artfully over one shoulder. The heels of his boots clicked quietly against white marble as he walked down an open hallway lined with tall, open archways cut through to the view of a dusky blue twilight fluffed with spun sugar clouds. Gradually the hallway smoothly widened into a wide, circular room; all open space, domed roof and pillars reminiscent of the classic Greek style cut from what would have been the walls. At the center of the area an elegant pedestal stood, crafted of what appeared to be quartz carved in intricate detail with vines of ivy and graceful cherry blossoms. Atop the flat surface sat a rather plain porcelain bowl, shallow, wide, and filled to the brim with clear liquid.

As he drew near to the bowl and its resting place, he paused, fair head tilted just slightly, as if he heard someone calling out to him.

"Azrael!"

A man, tall, broad-shouldered and muscular, approached at a light run to stop across from the black-clad angel of death. His face was handsome in a strong, masculine way; cheekbones sturdy, jaw squared and flat, his eyes a molten gold, his hair mahogany highlighted with summery streaks of copper. The billowy cloth of his shirt and slacks was woven of the purest white against skin of a golden tan. But it wasn't merely his looks which made him so very different from the other man. It was the way he held himself – with an air of importance that made one think of a self-satisfied rooster, puffed and ready to crow.

The newcomer smiled, and it lit his face with a brilliance which could have blinded the sun. Quite obviously this was the archangel Michael; the great warrior of the heavens who had hurled the devil from God's precious realm. "Azrael," he repeated, a light, almost teasing lilt to his voice, beneath which was an edge not unlike a chastising elder's reprimand. "Come now, this is foolishness. You know as well as I do that we're not meant to love like—"

"I know what I was told," Azrael interrupted, and while his tone was patiently humble, there was a detectable spot of weariness which hinted at the rekindling of an old, even stale argument. "And my sources say that I am completely within my rights to—"

Some of Michael's glorious light had faded within the a surfacing of mild impatience, yet he smiled with that infuriating air of self-importance still plastered to his lips as he said, "it isn't a question of sources. You cannot expect me to let my little brother just blindly fall into damnation for the sake of some human." He held out his hands, beseeching, almost the way a parent might to persuade a child who didn't understand the issue being discussed, the expression etched into his face calm and kindly. And yet it was somehow sour, false...a lie.

There was a stiff, chilly pause. "Some human…" the underlying note to Azrael's usually pleasant voice was cold. "I am not obligated to explain myself to you." He turned away, whipping his loose hair into a quick, tidy ponytail before bracing his hands against either side of the bowl. "Now, if you will excuse me, I have an appointment to keep—"

Closing around the blond angel's upper arm, Michael's hand a grip tighter than steel when he pulled his brother back from the pedestal. The majority of the bright, sunlight gleam was gone now; leaving only a trace of forced smile still firmly etched onto the golden-eyed male's mouth. A purposeful charade. "Perhaps you didn't hear me correctly," he spoke with an air akin to a finely-edged blade with which he tried to use to force the younger angel's obedience; hair-thin, fine as glass, and just as deadly when it shattered. "I will _not_ allow one of my brothers forfeit his place for the sake of some woman who is—more likely than not—destined to become a _harlot!" _

The heated flash of scarlet within Azrael's cool violet eyes was simply breathtaking – if you had a danger complex. The purple was almost entirely dissolved within a sea of blood-red brilliance when he lifted his gaze to meet that of his older brother head-on. His lips trembled as he hissed a reply, so cold that it could have frozen a glacier, infuriated by the nerve of the other angel to insult his ward.

"I don't give a _damn_ what you think." In one harsh snap of movement, he wrenched his arm away, the dark cloth of his garments straining against the dueling clash of grip. "Just because you were the one to banish Lucifer does not give you the right to order me. And don't presume that you know who I am," he snarled, and it echoed with a violent thrash of hatred while he turned on his heel, back to the pedestal, in deliberate defiance of the older angel. "Because you have never _once_ known."

"_Azrael!"_ A name of power, spoken with the accent devoted to invocation and command. "Don't you _dare_ walk through that door—" Words trailing into warning silence, the warrior archangel lifted one powerful hand to point (not slightly threateningly) toward the bowl of liquid lubricant serving as a thin doorway between realms.

Pale hair glimmering golden in the sunset of the heavens, his pale complexion stained glossy orange, he once again braced his hands against the bowl's stone perch he answered without gracing his brother with another glance. "You are not my mother." Then he simply lowered his face so that it broke the liquid's pearlescent surface...and all was gone.

_'O mother dear, this misery has settled like a stain upon my skin __– __a vast unspoken sin._

Lilith felt the air rush into her mouth with her gasp, her vision clearing from black-bathed nothingness as Azrael guided her back from the vivid, emotional world of his memory. Speechless, stunned, and utterly horrified, she mouthed, wordless, staring at nothing while she groped for the right words to accurately express her shock. But even when she had finally located her voice, words would not come. "I—you…what…he—?"

"He deserved it…but that hardly makes it justified." Azrael heaved a sigh, allowing his hands to lower and rest against the mattress at his sides. "I was tired, fighting off illness, and frustrated with the lack of support I had from those who were supposedly closest to me." He gave a contemptuous snort. "Michael just doesn't want his reputation tarnished by the fact that his little brother buried himself head-first in something he sees as sinful."

"But," Lilith put in meekly, vocabulary having returned to her, "technically, isn't he right? I mean, lust is referred to as one of the seven deadly sins…so wouldn't our relationship, for you, be a bad thing?"

For a moment, her question lingered, unanswered, upon the air, met with a lush kind of stillness that seemed lined almost with indulgent. Azrael's eyes opened once again, his long, dark lashes framing the edges of brow and cheekbones like ferns around a pool. "No," he told her, and pulled himself into a more comfortable position by draping his torso across her lap. "In the romantic sense, there can be no love without lust. It is what makes reproduction occur and is a part of the human psyche—how humanity was meant to be, as God made it. Sin is found when lust comes without its partner of love or affection. Otherwise, for all couples that truly care for one another, life itself would be a straight ticket to hell, which is rather unfair, even if one considers it objectively." A wince altered the composure at his mouth when he shifted, the hand against her knee tensing briefly in response to some needle of pain he felt biting at his bones.

"In an angel's case," he continued, sounding completely unfazed, "we were made to be above things that might caused lack of control—extreme emotions such as envy or anger, which in extreme cases tend to lead to one of the major sins, and a fall from grace. Yet we are far from perfect. God understands this more than anyone. In _my_ case, I was instructed to go to the house into which you had been born for a reason unrelated to my normal function. It was an order I followed without knowing what I would be getting myself into—but the Almighty more than certainly did."

"And...you know this for sure?"

"Yes. There is no sin here," he assured her, gently patting her knee. His touch was heavy, lethargic, and she could tell he was tiring. Even for such a brief stretch of wakefulness and activity, he was still in recovery and needed his rest; the effort to show her the memory of his brother had made away with a good deal of his reserved measures of strength. Despite weariness, he added softly: "even if there were, I would still be here."

Touched by this chivalrous, self-sacrificing way to tell her that he loved her, she smoothed her hand over his and kissed his forehead, tucking the edges of the blankets around his shoulders. "Go to sleep," she ordered sternly, knowing perfectly well it was inevitable anyway.

His answering smile jerked a flutter of joy from her heart. "Yes, My Lady," he answered drowsily, and then he was asleep, just as she'd requested.

Lilith sat up for a long while after her angel's breathing had long eased into silence, her mind grimly fixed to the hypocrisy in the world's beliefs. A great many of the things she had read focused on the world of the Christian Bible (and even some other holy books) now seemed like tomes full of injustice and lies. To think, out of all the angels, the most revered and worshipped was Michael. The one most feared and cursed; the one who lay asleep across her lap, childlike in his trust and affection. What liar had concocted such a bastardization of the truth?

It was a wrong she had never known, never would even have dreamt, had she not fallen so hard for the smiling, courteous entity she had first seen as a young human man. He had his flaws, as did anyone; he was protective, emotionally fragile, and psychologically scarred from the millennia he had lived as little more than a ghost. And yet the largest flaw…none of it was his fault.

She had always known he brought a hard life with him. Even she, naive as she had been (still was, in many respects), had seen that divinity was built on much more than floating about in the clouds all day, singing and watching humans toil. He was no mortal man to be contented with a slice of affection and a home-cooked meal every night after work...work he could neither go home from nor turn off for even a few days. The demands made of him were serious, large, burdening, and he needed all the help he could get in order to survive it, especially now that there was war in the air again. Somewhere Lilith had heard that man's blood had come from god's own hand. Now she wondered if that hadn't come from a reality that most human preachers would have found to be utter blasphemy; after all, god didn't bleed. Or did he...she? Her angels sure did.

Cuddling closer to him, she pressed another soft kiss to his cheek. He couldn't feel it, so lost in sleep he was, but it hardly mattered. He had done so much, given so much to her; now it was her turn, and she felt like she could have punched through a mountain if he asked her to. Devotion was contagious, it seemed.

The hours ticked slowly by, but Lilith felt nothing but awake and fully at peace. She stayed up all night, her fingers stroking the pale skin and hair of the man who had loved her since she had been a little girl. Not too long after the hour struck six in the morning did she fall asleep at her lover's side, unable to think of any place she would have rather been.

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**Oh my god, I am so sorry it took so long to get this chapter up for you, guys. This summer was a lot of surprises and activity that I wasn't expecting, involving me developing a social life before all my friends went back to school and I learned how to handle having a boyfriend. o-o not making excuses, that's just why it took so long.**

**Anywho, so I'm both pleased and sorry to announce that there are two more chapters to this volume of the MH saga/series. And...I haven't officially started the beginning of the second volume. But don't worry, I think I'm getting close to having plots!!! Yay!**

**Um...I think I'll leave it at that for now. Mayhaps more later/next chapter/whatnot. We'll see. I'm just going to submit and be off to work.**

**So, apologies again, hope you enjoyed, and pleasepleaseplease review for me!!! :3 Thank you so much for you patience and support  
**

**I love you all!!**


	44. Juggernaut

**Chapter 62: Juggernaut**

Recommended Listening: "Bring Me the Disco King" (Loner Mix) by David Bowie

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Dreams of a sky choked with soot kept Lilith mostly sleepless throughout the few hours following her descent to them. Her decision to finally take the constant tossing and turning as a sign to get up was sealed by the rather loud thumping which came through the thin bedroom wall from her neighbor's apartment that seemed to be the result of a multitude of heavy things being sloppily rearranged. While she had worried at first that she had slept in too late and left her partner in need of some kind, a bleary glance over her shoulder proved that Azrael was still fast asleep. _Truly_ asleep; the obvious lack of breath proved it. He wasn't conscious enough to put effort into breathing, so he must have been asleep. Thus, she had risen, not being one to lie aimlessly in bed, and ventured out into the afternoon light spilling into her living area.

The day was a cold one. Even after noon had come and gone, frost still rimed the blades of grass below just as it had plastered chilly patterns across the edges of the glass of the tiny kitchen window. Goosebumps prickled at her skin beneath the thermal, hooded shirt she'd donned over her camisole and rippled up her partially bared legs like a wave of cool air. Strangely cold for being indoors.

It was when she was just reaching for the bread drawer and the promise of a bagel to go with her wake-up coffee that she heard it – a soft sound of movement that she didn't recognize. It was as if a door or window had been left open and the draft seeping inside had suddenly increased in noise and pressure. But she was certain nothing had been left open, and Azrael had been dead to the world just moments ago, unfit to make any sort of movement large enough to explain what she sensed.

Having seen some of the things she had witnessed as of late, it wasn't possible not to react to such a strong feeling of oddness. There was something wrong. The tiny hairs at the back of her neck prickled a warning, her brain hissing at her to grab something to use as a weapon; not to stand there like a helpless child, but to defend herself from whatever was lurking beyond her sight. In another instant she had snatched up the frying pan settled to dry from the morning before, her bare feet silent upon the linoleum floor of the kitchen as she inched nearer to the corner of wall which followed along the small hallway leading to the front door to her apartment.

Her fingers tightened around the pan as she took a breath and peered around the corner, anxiously gripping the handle in both hands. Not a thing was out of place in the hallway. Nothing had moved since the other morning when she had knocked a shoe out of its proper spot with her load of shopping. Nothing was wrong…so why was her heart beating so furiously to break from her chest? She edged back toward the kitchenette, telling herself to calm down. She was just imagining things, perhaps her paranoid nature was just flashing into being for no reason. Yet when she turned around and came face-to-face with a pair of tawny golden eyes staring intently down at her from a sharp, clever face, she knew that assumption had definitely not been the case.

Purely on old, not-yet-destroyed reflex, Lilith panicked. Renewing her grip on the pan, she swung it with all the strength she could manage. But for all her intention of hitting the man square in the face, her blow was intercepted in a mere moment, the male's fingers closing tightly around her wrists and squeezing. His grip was strong and hard as hammered steel, but guarded, a care taken to keep from severing her limbs to pieces. At the same time, however, the shock of it caused her grip upon the frying pan to diminish. The heavy cooking tool dropped to the laminate floor with a clang that could have dragged the dead from their graves.

It had probably dented her floor, too...

"_Jesus Christ,_ woman! What'd I ever do to _you?_"

Recognition demanded that she be calmed, yet it was after a few split seconds of recollection and remembered betrayal that she bent, picked up the pan once more, and decked Beelzebub solidly in the side of the head. He wasn't that hurt by it, she could tell (and had long-since assumed was normal for a mortal's attempt to injure an immortal), yet he looked as though the entirety of his dignity and morals had been mortally offended. His brow was furrowed, lips pursed, his eyes narrowed in something tied between a glower and a measuring squint. "'The hell was that for?" he whined, gingerly fingering the assaulted temple while Lilith calmly proceeded to deposit the heavy skillet back inside its proper drawer.

"Be happy I didn't claw your eyes out, Jerk," was her muttered reply.

A crooked smile twisted the side of the demon's mouth, all slyness and sheepishness somehow combined to make a rather unnerving combination tied with a ribbon of regret. He'd recognized her reference to his comment during the social event in his native realm. "Oh...that. Yeah, I guess I deserved it."

Crossing her arms over her chest with a sniff, she bit back, "yes, you do. I don't know how you have the nerve to come in here without even so much as a knock afterwards. How could you actually let me think he was dead?"

"BFI."

"What?"

"Best friend's intuition." Ruffling He leaned back against the kitchen-side edge of the counter, denim-clad hip propped against the laminated wood, though there was really more rip than fabric to what had once been his jeans. What appeared to be neon green mesh flashed free underneath, matching the poisonous shade of the t-shirt stretched across the lean shape of his chest and shoulders, and typical of his deranged sense of fashion. "I had a feeling he might use the opportunity to have a bit of a looksie into your character—"

"A _test_, you mean," Lilith corrected, her tone dry as sand.

"—sure, if you want to put it so coldly," Beelzebub shrugged, "either way, I just did what I thought was right for the moment. And it worked, didn't it?"

This was almost funny. So much so that she came close to fetching the pan again just to bludgeon some sense of tact into the demon's thick skull. Both eyebrows lifted, the lilt in her voice questioned bluntly, "you mean I was _supposed_ to end up ripped half in two by guilt, cry myself to sleep, and wind up accusing him of being an imposter because you falsely led me to believe an angel could die?"

His lopsided smile vanished. "Not necessarily..."

"What then?"

"Jesus H. Christ," he swore again, "you really do turn into a drill-sergeant when you want something. All I'm saying is that the idea was to see how much you cared. Obviously you cared quite a lot, so the test—as you so brutishly put it—was a success. As far as believing an _immortal_ could die...you did that all on your own, hon. I didn't say a word about him never coming back." She still looked faintly livid around the edges, her eyes focused on the pan drawer as though she very much would have liked to retrieve her weapon of choice. Not entirely anxious to have a frying pan bust him in the head again, he added quietly, "considering what the man's been through, can you really blame him?"

She had no words for that. Almost guiltily she tilted her chin to the floor, unwilling to look at him, not wanting to see those inhuman, hawkish eyes boring into her forehead. He was right; of course he was. Perhaps it was better just to put the whole thing behind her…especially since, now that she took the energy top recall, he _hadn't_ actually said anything to condemn her hope, it had been her assumption.

Before she had a chance to even think about changing the subject, Beelzebub was exclaiming with a shout of; "well, good morning, Starshine!"

Her head whipped about so fast that the vertebrae crunched at the base of her neck. It stung, but it was inconsequential compared with the jolt she received when her eyes fell upon Azrael where he stood in the doorway to the bedroom. He was standing all on his own, showing no sign of discomfort or pain, his face mildly expressionless but for a tinge of drowsiness quickly fading from the corners of eyes and mouth. _Glory,_ but he healed quickly…

"So you _are_ here, then…that's good." Beelzebub scanned the angel's figure, quirking a disbelieving eyebrow as he took in the fluffy sheep patterning the angel's pajamas with an expression akin to mild incredulity mixed with a pinched despair.

"That I am," Azrael stepped outward from the threshold made shadowy from the drawn curtains in the room at his back, nearing where she stood in the widened mouth of the kitchen. At first he seemed perfectly fine...until he faltered, one hand darting out to grab the edge of the counter upon reaction to the brief weakening of his knees. It was incredible that he could keep himself upright. The damage he had received from his wounds had been considerable to say the least, and such a quick recovery, even with some remaining tender joints, was remarkable. Such was the power of the divine. Even still, Lilith couldn't deny the twinge of guilt that pierced her, hollow and achy, as she warily watched him.

Ignoring the trip with an impossible dignity while he waited for the weak spell to pass, Azrael questioned bluntly, "what is your business here? Who overrode my spells to send you in?"

With an insulted snort, Beelzebub rolled his eyes and grumbled, "oh that's nice. Hello to you too."

A sigh, and one of the angel's gripping hands went to pinch the bridge of his nose as though warding off a headache. "Hello Beel. Now really, it is crucial that I know how you got in here—"

"Yeah, yeah," the hellish prince hiked himself up to sit on the counter, huffing like a little boy being pestered into telling the truth by a pressing parent. "All those protection spells, misdirection charms, herbal wardings, etcetera and so forth that you've poured all your magic and soul into, I know. It's not my fault some of dear old daddy's Overseers know blood magic. I'm gonna tell you, so don't have a cow...or a sheep." The lavender pajamas earned another disdainful glance. "Michael sent me with a message."

Violet muted with a haze of gray and Azrael's arm slid out to wrap securely around Lilith's waist, pulling her to his chest, the other keeping a steady grip flat upon the counter. It was a request for comfort, which she recognized only by the distinct lack of demand to its silent wording; and after the bit of past she had been treated to the day before, she found it difficult to fault him for it. She understood that her guardian had very rigid feelings where it concerned his older brother, and she could tell by the way his fingers curled with the curve of her stomach that he did not like that the older angel had the power to send someone, messenger and friend or no, through his magical shields. From what little she understood about his world, such an action was not only careless for the unlucky intruder's safety without prior notice of a guest, but also undeniably rude.

She let her hand rest atop the partial-fist of his, hoping that her sympathy might be conveyed through her skin, and glanced toward the messenger, who was clearly very fortunate to have a trusted alliance with the caster of the spells surrounding her apartment like a coat of paint. Much to her surprise, Beelzebub didn't seem inclined to answer. He was staring at the joined hands…and actually appeared to view the contact with the barest traces of concern. The side of his cocky mouth was creased with the tiny line of a frown, the spark in his eyes gone somehow colder as he eyed the touch between woman and angel. In her turn, she stared back at him, shaken by the strange expression on the face she had always assumed was in full support of their relationship.

Yet Azrael didn't seem to have enough patience to wait for him to recover his sense on his own time. "What is it?" he prompted stiffly. He had noticed it too, then. She had never heard him speak so sharply to his friend.

Giving a small start, as though jerked out of a daydream, Beelzebub cleared his throat and recited, "You have the rest of today and tomorrow to recuperate. Upon the next morrow, you're ordered to return to your post." The hawk-like eyes closed briefly, and when they opened again they were directed toward the covered window of the living room, observing the leak of cold, winter daylight through the curtains. It was in that moment that he looked truly humanly tired, and Lilith realized that the stress of war could dampen the spirits of even the prince of tricksters and mischief-makers. "Uriel will come to collect you…with your things."

Lilith's insides clenched within the frame of her bones, pain and anger thrumming like liquor in her veins. A day and a half; that was all he was allowed after what he'd done? "But he's not healed," she blurted, gripping her guardian and lover's plain white shirt with fingers that trembled. "How can you expect him to fight when he's injured—?"

"Hush," the angel's voice was so soft that it silenced her instantly, his grip around her tightening as he pressed her close: whether for her comfort or his own, she didn't know. "It is more than I expected, and for that I am grateful." He looked up at the prince, and the edge to his demeanor shifted so swiftly that it almost sent her reeling. "Kindly inform Michael that I accept the orders given."

Sliding from the counter to set his feet lightly upon the floor, the demon clasped his right fist over his heart and inclined his head in what looked like a loose version of a formal salute. A _military_ salute, she realized. The casual friendship in the air had gone, swallowed by this tight, ceremonial regard. "Yes, Sir."

If she'd had the energy to gape, she would have. Beelzebub, a prince, was subservient to a seraph? He fought for heaven, then…there was no other explanation for being allowed to carry Michael's message, or for calling Azrael _sir, _of all things.

But before Beelzebub could transport himself elsewhere to do as bidden, Azrael spoke again, and this time it was inquisitive, sensitive, almost hesitant. "Beel…what aren't you telling me?"

"I—nothing…" Beelzebub turned his head so the mop of his silvery hair hid his face from view.

"Bullshit."

The flash of a golden glare. "Get out of my mood, asshole!" Lilith pressed her back into the chest of the angel behind her, unnerved by the show of rare, real rage that reminded her of what the punk-hearted Beelzebub actually was. Yet when Azrael merely looked at him, calm and waiting for a response, he let out a terse breath and seemed to relax all over. "Fine. It's just what he said when I was leaving… _If she'd never been born, this wouldn't have happened._ Something like that. Don't think it means anything, but it bothered me."

For a lengthy moment Azrael was completely silent, even his breath stilled to the point where she could no longer feel it rise and fall against her spine. He quite simply stopped being alive for a little while, which was strange, but not nearly the cause for panic it might once have been. She didn't pretend to know what they were talking about, but she did have a sinking suspicion that the topic wasn't a good one. In any case, it was to be discussed no more. Azrael found his grounding of thought and asked quietly, "what was your father's excuse?"

Beelzebub's eyes flickered toward Lilith for the briefest instant. "Usurpation. A threat from Heaven to his throne when his authority's overruled by a subject."

Pale and expressionless, Azrael offered a brief nod and quietly thanked his friend, adding, "give Michael my assent, please. And perhaps you might find a way to slip a dead snake into his scabbard when he is otherwise occupied?"

With a snigger of laughter and a jaunty half-wave, Beelzebub neatly vanished.

Yet it seemed that with his departure, in swept the unpleasant reminder of the clock ticking away until a day after the coming tomorrow. While Azrael sighed, sounding tired (if reasonably complacent), Lilith could feel her veins rushing with a cold kind of fury. She turned to look at him, fuming, "why do they treat you like this?" He gave her a questioning glance, pale head tilted slightly to one side, and she elaborated. "Michael and the rest of them. It's like they don't _care_ about the sacrifice you made, or that you're still healing…" She couldn't find the right words to express the outrage boiling her from the inside outward.

He did not seem to share her anger, however; in fact, he seemed infuriatingly undaunted by the limited recovery time. This he proved when telling her, "they do because they have to."

"You—"

"Listen to me," his voice was firm as he cupped her chin with one palm, forcing her eyes to meet his – temperance for temper. "We all have our part to play. We are soldiers, Lilith, that was what we were created to be, and we do it because it is what we know. We defend what is good and right and true because we still believe such things exist. The ones we fight do not, their hopes are tarnished by over-exerted time and energy into discovering a way around what exists to find what cannot be." He smiled at her, and it was a beautiful, sad, and sweet in companionship to the gentled words: "I am a warrior of God, one who knows his place as a commander. I should have been back with my fighters the moment I regained reasonable consciousness, and my brothers and sisters should by right have demanded that I do so. But they allow me this time because we are siblings by nature and we _do_ love one another."

She didn't believe that – not completely. He couldn't actually expect her to believe that Michael, at the very least, cared, not when he had taken it upon himself to show her that the golden prince of the heavens had held neither sympathy nor understanding for his younger brother's pain. The others…she supposed she had no right to judge. But the reek of injustice still left a sour taste in her mouth. She tugged away from Azrael's grasp, not wanting him to read the petulance of the grudge on her emotional scale, but doing do jostled him in a way his body had not been prepared for. His knees buckled, his arm jerking quickly for the counter that would not be close enough.

Moving with speed she hadn't known she possessed, Lilith darted forward again, her arms wrapping around the angel's middle and preventing him from tumbling to the floor. "I'm sorry!" she cried, horrified that she might have hurt him. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…"

He smiled, bracing his hands at either of her hips as he waited out the return of his strength. As she looked into his eyes, however, there was something that had changed; a hard, glittering energy that roiled for release. "I have fought in more wars that I know how to count. I have seen things that would drive a sane man mad or streak your hair with white," he traced the deep brown fall of her bangs with a skimming fingertip, "and every one I have despised with every fiber of my being." The lilt was soft, subdued; yet in every word there was a vehemence that pulled her attention to him, magnetic and powerful. She had no choice but to listen, despite any predetermined willingness.

"I hated it," he stated bluntly. "I had no wish to fight or kill…all I wanted was to be free from the shackles that I had forged for myself; doomed for all time to serve a master I had no want to spill blood for. All I fought for was the pain, the want to die. Of course I pursued the upholding of righteousness and whatnot, but my goal was death, throwing myself into a new conflict hoping that it—this time, or the next time—would be the very last I would know of the miserable excuse for life I had."

She gaped at him, entranced, both by the ember-like burn within his eyes and the fervor echoing in his voice. His stance shifted, the surge of energy replenishing his strength to stand. "But now I have no ache to feel my own element. No apprehension, no dread. This time, I _want_ to fight."

"But…" her eyes widened, awed by the shimmering blush of power that stained his aura a brilliant white. "Why?"

"Why?" His arms encircled her waist and pulled her close, one hand twining amid the dark hair at the nape of her neck as he touched his cheek to hers, murmuring gently against her ear, "because now I have something that I want to protect." The whisper of a kiss was touched to her temple. "You, dearest."

_If she'd never been born, this wouldn't have happened._

A terrible sliver of realization wrapped its icy fingers around her throat. "This is because of me…" she choked, her lips trembling with the effort it took her not to burst into a fit of horrified screaming. She didn't even need to hear whose tongue had uttered the accusation, because she knew it was true. "You're at war because of _me_—"

"No," he told her firmly, giving her a stern, searing look that drove the exclamation from her mouth; his eyes a violet so dark that it could have been black, glittering with flashes of rich purple. "The immortal realms have been at conflict for millennia before your birth, this was bound to happen. You are not the reason. You are merely the excuse he is using to give himself a right to his claim on the Almighty's rule."

"_Him?_"

"Lucifer," he said softly, gently, as though giving depth or volume to the name might give it the power to summon the soul it belonged to right into her kitchen. "The very walls of Hell have ears, so it is little surprise that His Majesty discovered what I have done. He is a pompous, self-imposed creature and adores his own power, thus, by both making you immortal and then sneaking you out of the realm without requesting his leave to do so, no doubt he could very well twist my action into some undermining scheme to overthrow his rule and put Beelzebub on his throne." The tilt to Azrael's mouth was sharply thoughtful; "then again, he is also much cleverer than many give him credit for. I have difficultly believing he truly sees the unregistered presence of a single hybrid to be a real threat. The only possible explanation is a political manipulation of circumstance…which of course is—"

The words were as good as silence – she did not hear them. She stood, still and silent, her eyes fixed to a spot on the stainless white fabric of his shirt, seeing nothing. Locked away deep inside herself, she didn't notice the streaks of warm liquid that leaked from between her lashes, trailing down her cheeks like tiny drops of sorrow. She couldn't believe it…simply couldn't find the means to comprehend. A war had been started over the fact that she had been made into an immortal. People – _his_ people – would get hurt. How much pain would be on her blame? How many good, lawful, righteous souls would be punished because she had found the audacity to fall in love with him?

With a strangled, choking gasp she backed away and buried her face in her hands, the noise of surprise and protest he uttered falling on deafened ears. "I d-don't want people fighting over me—" she wailed, swiping half-heartedly at her watering eyes.

"Did you not hear me?" The inquiry was kind but firm when he gripped her shoulders; his fingers curled around the bone and flesh in a bind as secure as a leather strap and as soft as a butterfly's kiss. "Politics make words and claims seem personal, but they are not. It is not because of you." When the pace of her sniffles only seemed to quicken in response, he gave her a tender smile and coaxed her forward into the warm shelter of his arms. "Hush, darling. Do not tear yourself up over such a trivial thing—"

"Trivial!" She stared up at him consumed with a breathless, wide-eyed shock. "You call a full-fledged holy war _trivial?_"

"Yes, trivial," he repeated calmly, stroking her hair with the palm of one patient hand. "Conflict rises and it falls, as does much of nature. And I told you long ago that pain for us is purely temporary, so that aspect of your guilt is sweet, but unnecessary." There was a steady pause before he added in a deeper, much more serious tone that seemed to encompass the buried essence of the angel's birth-given elemental sight; "I also know that plots of pulling the trigger to start another war were being whispered long before you ever knew I existed. You should not feel so responsible."

Her entire being seemed to shrink, power and presence thin and shivery, as she pressed her cheek to the flat space between his shoulder and the curve of his chest, squeezing her eyes tightly shut. Tears stained the white fabric of his shirt and made it stick to her skin, yet she paid it no mind. "But people die in wars…" Doing her best to swallow a whimper, her fingers twisted the fabric at his back, using it as grounding in attempt to pull herself together.

Uncomfortable silence followed her; the rhythm of his breath the only movement she knew while his chest rose and fell beneath her touch. Only the beat of his heart – soft, steady, and soothing. Only the warm pressure of his palms against her lower back as he held her, giving as much stability as he might have been receiving. When he did finally speak, it was with a hushed, delicate honesty as the murmured "you are worth dying for" slipped from between his lips.

She could only tuck her face into the curve of his throat and shake her head to disagree. "No," she whispered, "don't say that—"

"What purpose could I have to lie to you?" The vibration of his speech was a soothing sensation against her temple, each syllable lined with absolute truth. "I _would_ die for you, if I had the ability and the need."

"And you think I want that?" she snapped, temper flaring hot enough to exact a weak slap directed toward the vicinity of his forearm. "I'd find a way to resurrect you just to kill you again for doing such a _stupid_—"

"Calm down," he soothed, musical voice carefully arranged to inspire serenity and peace. "I cannot die, dearest. Do not waste your time plotting my demise for a second time when there will never be a first." He sighed, resting one elegant cheekbone against the dark crown of her head, and murmured, "come my calling, I will leave because I must. For all the pain it gives me to turn away from you, I will feel better knowing that there is something good coming from it."

Lilith sighed, irritable, and sniffled. Turning to wipe her eyes with a hand that she freed from the confines of Azrael's iron-banded grip about her torso with his powerful arms. "_Nothing_ good comes from violence," she insisted, "yours or anyone else's."

Her hands slid along the sloping contours of his abdomen, fingertips curling around the line of his shoulders just before her arms wrapped around his neck – a touch filled with the desperate itch for comfort. There was no rustiness to his movement or posture now, nor was he faltering every other moment while his strength came and went like a fluctuating tide, and it seemed that he had regained at least the part of his power which took care of the little details. To her it was an omen both good and ill – for though it was a symbol of his imminent recovery, it was also a cold reminder that he would soon be called into service.

She understood that he had to go and respected the reasons he gave her. She knew that despite appearances and preferences, he was a fighter by nature, created for chaos and born for battle, raised for war. His people were created to fight and to be victorious – ageless, sculpted perfection within each and every one of them, specifically attuned to their own personal niches to create an army of unbelievable proportion and ability. Yet for all of this understanding, she also knew she would not welcome the morning that would call him from her side. She clung to him with renewed energy, squeezing his body tightly without further fear of harming him, as though the thought of letting him go was tied to the scrap of human terror that whispered she might never see him again.

While his eyes dueled between the shades of sorrow and sympathy, he noticed her distress. He combed the fingers of his hand through the tresses of dark brown that tumbled nearly to her waist in a smooth, satiny curtain; trying to sooth, trying to be a comfort to her in her need, just as she had been the rock for him during his period of weakness. "Against popular parental belief, many things can be resolved only by way of aggressive negotiation. It is the way of imperfection and, aside from God, we are _all_ imperfect."

It was obvious that she was put out with his insistence, but she merely hugged more tightly, clutching at his strong shoulders, the tip of her nose nuzzling against his throat and noting that the soft, musky scent of his skin seemed more pronounced here. A thick, almost heady smell, dark and sensual and intimate – his own personal brand of cologne, and much more affective than any store-bought substance could ever be. It ensnared her senses with an unfair amount of expertise, slowing her reaction time and speeding up her heartbeat without any reason or cause. She let out an acquiescent breath, finding herself consoled by the warm, familiar scent of him. "Take me to bed," she pleaded quietly, feeling tired and tried.

A deep, languid purr accompanied the flash of his smile when he told her, "with pleasure," his lips against her cheek. The shift in his grip told her very clearly that one more word from her would have him slinging her over his shoulder and carrying her to bed for what was sure to be an utterly thorough ravishing. Playing with the idea in a pocket of her mind, she admitted that it was a tempting picture…but with his current state still questionable and her current mood so low, she knew that now was not the time. All the same, she could be grateful for the lightened air of the conversation topic.

She laughed. "Not _that_ way, you insatiable man!" Her voice was teasingly scandalized; but a slight blush had risen in her cheeks as she unwittingly (and somewhat wistfully) recalled the first time they had made love. All the same, she was thankful to hear his belling laughter join hers. He _had_ been teasing, yet he made no point to hide the fact that had she taken a liking to his hinted suggestion he would have carried through with it. The kiss he offered was just slightly too deliberate to prove otherwise, the press of his lips a bit too firm, the touch of fingers at the back of her neck just slightly more intensely directed than was perhaps required for a purely casual gesture. He obeyed her request, however, taking her by the elbow and looping his other arm about her waist to guide her back toward the bedroom.

"My apologies," he commented lightly, all the while the subtle glimmer to his blue-shaded eyes said that he wasn't the slightest bit sorry.

He tucked her tenderly under the covers before sliding under the blankets on his side to curl up behind her, her living pillow, limbs twined around her and his chin tucked above her head. "I still wish you didn't have to leave," she whispered, "I feel safe with you. It's strange when you're gone." Lilith's eyes flickered closed, her breath let out in a soft huff as she twisted to arrange herself on her back. Her brow furrowed, "you know, Alice said I should buy a goldfish…maybe I should."

Thoroughly amused by her likening him to a goldfish, his throat filled with quiet laughter. "Perhaps," he said softly, and kissed her cheek. But his amusement was short-lived, for he had just foreseen a dilemma.

Lilith was still in danger. Whether here or in hell, Lucifer was still determined to locate the human woman that had infiltrated his realm then seemingly escaped without his notice, and he was not pleased to keep missing her. As driven and vindictive a hunter as Lucifer was, the very last thing Azrael wanted was to leave his precious ward alone without someone there to keep an eye on her. What he_ needed_ was a guardian…a sentinel of some kind to watch over her as his substitute.

The first and ideal option was to ask invoke the help of one of Gabriel's messengers or Uriel's spies to keep an eye on her. This was an impossibility for one major reason; that even if he could enlist one of these, the only subjects available would not be someone he would trust Lilith's life to. But it wasn't that much of a loss, then, was it? After all, he had allies in all sorts of places, magics that hadn't yet invoked. "We will take care of that tomorrow," he murmured absently, giving her hand a light squeeze.

"Hmm?" she opened one eye, her gaze hazy with sleepiness and with the obvious lack of connection, though she seemed open enough to the prospect despite the fact that she didn't know what he was talking about. "'Kay."

The smile was one of his dazzling ones, as sweet as it was loving and tender, pale and exquisite. His lips brushed her forehead as he whispered, "sleep, dearest." His voice deepened; the notes like a drop of hot, shivering liquid slipping into the ear that enticed the listener to obey him. "Sleep."

Not for the first time, Lilith wondered just how much control her lover held over her mind and body, but the command was one that she did not have the strength to avoid. Her breath deepened, lavish and luxurious as the rhythm lengthened into that of slumber, her eyes slipping closed while her head lolled against her pillow. It was an easy transition, the already stress-weary mind needing no excess persuasion to cross the barrier between consciousness and dormancy. She was asleep within the very moment after the word dripped from his tongue like warm honey.

The angel remained awake, his eyes on the wall upon which the moonlight fell, streaming in through the crack between curtain and wall. Violet irises swirled dark with shadow, concentration and decision etched into the lines of his face, he cast a single glance at the sleeping woman to make doubly sure that she was locked within sleep, glad that only one hand was needed for the particular summoning spell he needed. Lifting his preferred right hand, he gazed at the white of his skin as his fingers tensed and bent with the complex, whirling combination of signs and gestures that created the correct channeling range. Flashes of silver pierced his darkened eyes, highlights caught from the sheen coloring the air around his rapidly sketching fingers, a faint crackling of energy rending tiny tears in the atmosphere. When he spoke, it was with the guileless, piercing power of Death's inescapable will.

"Unto the light, I command thee…"

The final mark was drawn as a quick slash to the right through the air with his index finger, the silver congealing to shattering into a thousand splinters of light and sound when he released the spell. The blinding flash faded, leaving nothing but cool, quiet memory.

Blinking away the remnants of his deeper persona, he turned to look down at the floor beside the bed. There, curled up on the neutral beige carpet, was a mass of black and silver fur, muzzle resting upon two shovel-like forepaws, nine fluffy tails curled about its body like several long mufflers. Around its neck circled a thick collar of blue-dyed leather stamped with glittering numerals – _XIII_ repeated over and over, printed amid the material. Azrael reached down, fingers twining with the warm, downy-soft fur of the summoned creature. A heavy breath was released in answer, as if the mass of darkness were remarking on how very inconvenient it was to be summoned during the middle of a highly restful nap.

"Apologies, old friend," the angel murmured, resting his pale gold head on the pillows beside his lady and closing his timeless eyes. "I have a favor to ask of you."

*

"Lilith…"

It was his voice that called to her, soft and warm as a summer breeze, drawing back the haze of slumber that held her fast between its hands. She had no choice but to obey. Green eyes opened, lids flickering as her lashes parted from her cheeks to allow her slightly groggy vision. Her lover and guardian's handsome face smiled down at her, his hand smoothing trails of her dark hair away from her forehead as he watched her wake. Consciousness became steadily more pronounced and aware as her focus shifted. "Yes?" she asked after he allowed her to sit up and prop her back against the pillow-cushioned headboard beside him. "Did you need something?"

"I want to show you something." Reaching over his side of the bed, he stretched a hand toward the carpeted floor, pale hair slipping over his face as his body leant over toward the edge of the mattress, calling, "up here, boy." And with that, a large quantity of dark fur and large, padded feet leapt gracefully onto the foot of the bed to land between their legs, warm and fluffy and friendly, wagging the nine tails that extended from its rear end with happy greeting as it licked Azrael's offered hand with an enthusiastic pink tongue.

She squealed, unable to help herself, and reached out to bury her hands in the big dog's silk-soft fur, her fingers ruffling the silvery guard hairs that shaded the thick, luxurious ruff. It was shaped like a Malamute, regal of face and build, keen-eyed, friendly and seemed like it had been born from a patch of the night sky. With its nine elegant tails, swirls of silver, and eyes of a pale, crystalline blue, she knew that this was no mere mortal-bred dog. But she didn't care one bit, because right then, he was the cuddliest thing since the plush frog she'd had as a little girl. "He's _beautiful!"_ she informed a grinning Azrael while the dog plopped down across their laps and thrust his wolfish head into her hands with a pleased nudge and a flurry of wagging tails.

"This is Cerberus," the angel introduced, his hand stroking the strong line of the dog's back as he watched her scratch the silky, ebony ears. "He has been a friend of mine for a very, very long time, and is going to stay and keep you company while I am gone."

Lilith's eyes flickered with a mixture of joy, intrigue, and slight sadness spurred by the mention of her guardian's imminent departure, her hands slowing in their eager petting as she looked up at him. "What is he?" she asked, indicating the nine furry tails that formed a river of trailing dark fur pouring over the edge of the bed and onto the floor. "A demon?"

Azrael paused; his eyes darkening briefly as with some evil memory, and then lightened again once he forced it back long enough to give her an answer. "A…servant of death, if you will, given a body to suit his needs and purpose," he touched the blue leather collar dusted with tiny numerals for thirteen, "and given my number to mark him as my helper."

For some reason, Lilith knew immediately that this was not the entire truth of the matter. The whole story was not to be given to her, at least not yet; and though that both annoyed and intrigued her, she knew that there was reason to his cryptic words this time. There was no need to doubt anything, and so she didn't…but she was still slightly disturbed by the words that flashed across her mind like a screensaver, erupting from nowhere in particular as she continued to lavish the hellish dog with attention. For some reason, as they silently moved on to other things, spending their last full day together in complete relaxation together, she could feel that the calm before the storm was drawing to a rainy close.

She knew her life had changed, in some ways for the better, and in others for the less than pleasant. Bound to things she could still only barely grasp the concepts of, barred from some of the things she loved for reasons of safety; even now that the deed was done, it was a little difficult for her to think about the world she had been absorbed into. Harder still was the way she had to fight herself for calm enough to avoid thinking about the imminent departure of her guardian angel to the war she was the blamed cause for.

It was not the first time in her life that Lilith wondered what would have happened if she hadn't been born.

* * *

**First things first: I have no way to accurately apologize for how long I made you wait for this chapter. I am so, so sorry. I'm afraid all I can really say is that the past few months have been really hard on me, and just in these last few days was I able to sit down and do any proper editing so I could get this up. Mainly it was school...I took a creative writing class, and not only was it hellish (no pun intended), but it leeched me of any energy to work on MY stuff. LAME.**

**In any case, I'm off for winter break until January, and I hope to finish up Volume I before then so I can get cracking on Volume II. Hopefully all will work as planned. I'm also going to take this opportunity to change the story's title to add it's Volume title, so if it's changed, fear not! It's just to make it easier to tell apart the five volumes...once I get more than one up...**

**I seem to be raking in a few new readers lately, which is fun anf exciting! :D welcome anyone new, and thank you for reading!**

**I'm going to shut up now and leave you be to review! (Please, please, please?) Because it really does mean a lot to me...you have no idea, unless you're a fellow writing, in which case I'm sure you do and therefore have no excuse not to. :) I love you all! Thank you so much for your patience and loyalty!**

**Until next time!**


	45. Universal Soldier

**Chapter 63: Universal Soldier**

Recommended Listening: "Fade" by Theatre of Tragedy, "Corynorhinus" and "Lasiurus" by Hans Zimmer & James Newton Howard (from **Batman Begins**)

* * *

"You really are going to fight, aren't you?"

He paused mid-reach, hand extended, intent upon gathering the roll of clean gauze sitting quaint and tidy atop the bathroom counter. Eyes gentle, he glanced at her reflection in the mirror to watch her lean against the corner of wall between the doorway and the towel bar before resuming the task of replacing the bandaging that padded the remnants of the cut in his side.

His broken ribs and injured lung had all repaired themselves nicely; it was just the one stubborn cut that proved a problem, a lingering reminder of what he had done for the planet just days ago. The gash had primarily healed but for the small closed slice that remained tender, threatening to tear open again if he strained too much, which was almost a certainty considering the situation. Not even a trace of bruising was left on his beautiful, snow-pale body. But time had flown far too quickly – as it is fond of doing, making fools of all who are servants to it – and he was still not at his top condition. Yet even despite his remaining injury (however minor) and the slight recurring weakness that sometimes arose in his limbs, he had risen with the sun to ease into a flurry of exercises.

Lilith had stayed quiet, simply watching as he limbered up the body that had remained inactive for too long with a few hundred pushups, stretches, crunches, and other such things to limber up and work the kinks from the borrowed humanoid shell. The shell which had remained inactive for what really only accounted for a few mere hours when measured against the total amount of universal time he had spent in one. It was difficult to put the span of his injuries in perspective when the number of variables escaped the onlooker's knowledge. She didn't know how much hurt he was suffering, nor how much he had suffered prior to this state of mostly-healed mending. She knew only that whatever the amounts, the damage had been enough. And somehow he was able to roll over and wring out another set of pushups without taking hurt for it.

The recognition of immortal strength and stamina no longer went ignored out of ignorance.

Yet all the while she watched, her heart sank perpetually lower; with every passing moment the feeling numbed into a bitter ache until he had finished, stood, and retreated to wipe himself off with a clean towel and replace his dressings. She'd said nothing since the previous evening, when bidding him a cheerful good night, and it had been apparent from the very instant of her waking that the looming dark of his imminent departure had finally caught up with her. No matter that she knew he had to, she didn't want him to go.

"Yes," he told her, voice soft with mingling traces of both sympathy and sullenness, "I must do as I am told." He turned around, tucking in the end of his bandage with deft fingers – hands belonging to a man that had seen his share of injuries. Those very same hands took the folded remains of the clothing he had worn during the magical upheaval that had drained him so, handling the torn and bloodstained garments with a calculating care. With first the fancily cut shirt, then the two-layer slacks, he skimmed the outsides with palms that glowed with a steady, iridescent flame of violet power. Back and forth, reminiscent of a needle being pushed to and fro through the cloth to repair the rents and tears and burn out the red-brown stains marring the pure white and black shades. A smooth and simple repair job. One that seemed to have little effect on his energy reserve.

He shrugged the shirt on over the layer of bandage striping his torso and fastened the silver clasps up the front, righting the placement of the hem along the belt of strangely styled slacks. The tiny tinkling of silver bells accented the bend of his body, picking up first one boot and then the other to fasten them with quick flicks of his wrists, lacing them up his calves. As he finished, Cerberus' whine lifted like a sorrowful mourning cry from the other room.

The dog's pale blue eyes were sad, looked up from his place across the foot of Lilith's bed – head on his paws, protesting the parting he knew was to come. Azrael looked over his shoulder, flashing the hellhound a tight smile. "None of that, now." Stepping through the open doorway separating the two rooms to cross the floor, one white hand affectionately teased the black and silver fur of the dog's ruff. "Take care of her, little brother," he said, and though his body was sternly controlled to be still, the angel's voice held very faint traces of trembling.

Fighting the temptation to seize him around the middle and never let go again, she stepped up beside him, reaching out to stroke the creature's inky muzzle with the tips of her fingers. "We'll be fine," she gave him a shaky smile, doing her very best to put off a brave and comforting front for him.

He did not return the gesture, gave no sign that he'd heard (though she knew he had); his eyes were blank, perfect mouth set in a straight, terse line as he stood gazing down at the dog, Cerberus' eyes on his. It was as if they were conversing, using their eyes to speak with one another mind-to-mind. Most likely Azrael was detailing exactly how the dog was to keep watch over her in his absence, and while she almost resented his caution, she knew better than to argue with him. He was only doing it because he cared, and she had not the heart to send him off with a disagreement on his mind. He had much more important things to think about now.

"Should anyone ask you, I was called away on military duty," he told her, adding softly as his eyes briefly closed, a fine crease at the edge of his mouth, "I regret that I will be unable to fulfill my duty to Jessica. Will you relay my apologies?"

Her nod came automatically even despite the pang of sadness that overtook her at his words. No more sessions of bliss locked in the warm simultaneous mixture of solace in the arms of her art and her lover. Not for a stretch of time the length of which she couldn't possibly have an answer for. "Is it safe to go?" she asked him, not having forgotten that she had been tracked to the studio before.

"It should be," came his reassurance. "I have no reason to believe otherwise..." He paused and took a glance at her face, his expression thoughtful, "though it may be troublesome for those counting on your presence when it may become unpredictable. You will need to be transported back to Hell now and again, remember, and I cannot promise prompt deliveries for practice."

The sheer weight of the regret layered amid the sound of his voice pained her to hear, momentarily stifling the mask of determination to seem confident and secure that had taken command over her attitude. Catching it before it had a chance to show, she pushed the barb of empathy aside in favor of a small, conceding smile. "That's true. Maybe I'll make it easy on them and just say we're both otherwise occupied." It would probably be better that way. If she made the excuse he had given, she could always plead emotional sensitivity to back out of her obligations to the dance school. Such a distancing would lessen the loss of two principle dancers and give enough time to make arrangements for substitutes, because he was right; no one could afford her being absent for days on unknown end.

He looked away. "I'm sorry. If I had known this would happen I'd never have—" Silenced by the fingertip she laid against his lips, he never completed the half-spoken contrition.

"You didn't know," she said, quiet despite the vehemence behind the interruption. "You said yourself it's impossible to see the future. What's done is done, there's no reason to tear yourself up over something you can't change." There was more she could have said; like how glad she was to have made the choice she had, or that she didn't mind the break from dancing. So much left without words to give them form or structure, spoken only through the touch of her fingers to his mouth and cheek. It said more, without the warp of misused speech. He didn't need her to speak in order to hear. The soft, tender light in his eyes when he looked at her told her so.

The suddenness of his change on focus startled them out of the moment. He looked up, gazing toward the north face of the building at nothing in particular, as though something loud and audible to his ears alone had captured his attention. The color of his eyes paled to a shade of watery lavender, a sigh spilling the breath from his lungs – an expression of taxed, deliberate resignation. "Time to go."

She followed him into the hallway, Cerberus using a shallow leap to vacate the bed and trot dutifully after her, padding lightly on the linoleum spread as a white-carpeted pathway toward the call of duty. The angel walked steadily through her apartment, a ghostly, shadowed specter melded of darkness and light. An agreement stood, wordless, between the two of them. He did not have to ask her to and she did not need to tell him she would. She would not be the woman who hid inside, sobbing and uselessly carrying on while her warden prepared and left; she would not be a coward and leave him to his own company. Not now. Owing him more than that after all he had done for her, and because of their history (however brief), she knew that she could never have had the strength to simply look the other way.

He was waiting by the walkway that led from the covered parking to the street, dark and impassive, sitting astride a large, steel-gray gelding – Uriel, the archangel of wisdom and watchfulness. Unlike the suit in which she had last seen him, Lilith noted that he looked much more suited to the mythical connotation befitting an immortal in the wine-colored raiment spilling across the horse's flank. The garments made the unreal glory of him easier to process with a delicate mortal perception. Deep eyes shifted back and forth from angel to hybrid, the barest traces of sympathetic sorrow just visible in his stoic expression. It was a reminder to her that Azrael had told her true; at least this brother cared enough for him to show sympathy in the face of heartache.

In his right hand Uriel held a longbow. An elegant weapon strung and ready for use, he balanced it across his lap almost as a noble lord would a beloved hunting hound after a hard session of work. A quiver of arrows tipped in gold was slung across his scarlet-clothed back. The cold gray light of the winter sun played upon the tips, causing glittering spell-marks to flash like shards of spark along the razor edges. In the left hand he held the reins of a second horse – this one a cream-colored palomino mare. She perked up, prancing lightly about on slim hooves, whickering a greeting to the approaching angel who was her master.

Lilith could feel a part of her pause, wondering at the horse's resemblance to a dream she had not long ago had. At the time she had thought it a mere coincidence based on archaic myth and superstition. But it seemed that Death really _did_ ride a pale horse. Something about the whole thing unnerved her, seemed strangely unnatural. Yet the feeling didn't linger long. Distraction made quick work of it.

Uriel's marble lips parted. "Are you ready?" he murmured, quiet voice clear as the tolling of a gentle bell against the oddly still morning air. Azrael's answer was uttered much too softly to be heard by her ears, yet whatever it was, the words gained him a nod from his older brother. He took the mare's reins from his brother's hand and swung himself into the saddle, tucking booted toes into the stirrups and loosening his grip upon the bridle to give the mare more lead, nudging her toward where Lilith stood, balancing precariously upon the curb.

It was chilly, and she had to wrap her arms around herself to keep from shivering, her teeth gritted to prevent any audible chatter. Even Cerberus twining about her legs didn't help as much as she would have liked, though it was certainly appreciated. She looked up at Azrael – with awe in response to the majesty of the picture he made…and in grief, her eyes lowered to the ground. Hesitantly, she reached out to pat the mare's sleek neck, a purely fidgety movement, and one that did not hide her emotion from her guardian and lover's keen eyes.

"Chin up, My Lady," Azrael's fingers brushed her cheek and she glanced back up in time to see his eyes shadow with the gray shades of sober anguish matching how she felt inside. "A frown does not suit your face."

She tried to smile, she really did…but the expression felt more like a grimace than anything else so she let it fall. "Be careful," she told him, voice trembling though she did all she could think of to prevent it.

"_You_ be careful. You stand with more risk than I do." he corrected her, gently cupping her chin with a palm while he leaned closer. "I will do my best to keep you informed of what is happening, if and when I can find messengers—" He shook his head, as if thinking better of bringing up the subject, and whispered, "never mind," breath a warm wash against her skin.

Hands braced against both the horse's side and Azrael's knee, she stood on tiptoe as he leaned down in order to press his mouth to hers. It was a desperate kiss, full of meaning for as short as it was, hands gripping at face and leg while they used the touch to tell each other that no, this was not an end to anything. They _would_ see one another again. Lilith almost broke down to tears when he pulled her nearer, drinking in her taste and touch as though determined to fix it to his memory; the hot liquid stung her eyelids, bitter and remorseful, her fingers twisted in the silky strands of his hair. When he pulled back, his lips barely a whisper away from hers, he murmured, "_a'le Ahnlaeh."_ Warmth poured into her, flushing the winter cold from her blood and replacing it with the blessing he had touched to her lips. A final gift from him to his consort.

Uriel's voice faded into an expectant hush tinged with regret. "Azrael—"

"I know, I come," the pale-haired angel answered the half-spoken summons, his fingertips tracing Lilith's cheekbone one last time before sitting up and allowing his hand to trail away.

Gripping the mare's reins in hands gloved with form-fitted leather, Azrael nudged the graceful animal into a walk to follow Uriel's gray gelding into the silent, motionless street. There was barely a sound, no birds and no voices; in fact, the city seemed frozen in time, having slept through its alarm clock, struck dumb by the winter itself. Neither black nor scarlet turned back to her, and neither angel spoke. Exchanging some silent agreement, they kicked their mounts into a thundering, full-out gallop, peerless faces to the north while the clouds gathered dark and ominous in the sky above. Within moments they had gone, leaving her in their wake. And though it was strange to see a pair of riders streak off along the streets of a modern-day city, she wondered if she had ever seen anything so strikingly moving or so terribly beautiful in her life.

A soft, piteous whine lifted from the general vicinity of her knees and she looked down to see a mournful looking Cerberus staring off in the direction his master had gone. Cold, alone, consumed by the reality of the notion of war…Lilith felt her stomach rise into her throat, swelling with a horrible level of sadness. Dropping to her knees to wrap her arms around the hell-hound's neck, she buried her face in his soft, dark fur; surrendering to the pain clawing at her insides like the metal claws she remembered had once aimed for her heart. She clutched at the dog whose glorious tails drooped sadly onto the pavement, fighting the pressure and knowledge of the moment striking her more deeply than perhaps it should have.

Despite it all, she didn't cry. While she sat there perched upon the curb for quite some time, even as it began to rain, she never moved from her post; moving might jerk her into tears, and she flat out refused to break down now. Her guardian was at little risk – he was immortal, and stronger than he sometimes seemed. She should be strong too.

Later, hair plaster to her back and soaked to the skin with rainwater, she was shepherded indoors by a clearly concerned Cerberus. The big black dog guided her slowly and carefully up the stairs by nudging at the legs of his absentminded charge with a cold, damp nose until reaching the door to the apartment, where he whined and rubbed his face against her hip until she snapped out of her miniature trance. After toweling her hair into a state of reasonable dryness, and fluffing the dog's fur with the same towel to a pleased melody of oddly canine purring, she entered her bedroom intent on hunting for a change of clothes. She would not remember that she hadn't redressed, for once she walked in her attention was immediately usurped by the sight of one of the books propped open atop the mildly cluttered surface of her bedside table.

Curious, she approached and picked up the volume. It was one of the six she had borrowed from work after being introduced to a real-live angel; she had made it through two and a half before losing interest and later abandoning the pursuit of information, assuming (after her discussions with the angel in question) that most of it was probably false anyway. Across the span of two pages was a single composition of text. One line she recognized, but she had never before taken the time to analyze the rest of the content or the meaning behind it.

"Our Father, who art in heaven," she read, aloud, though she didn't know why she wished to hear the words spoken in her own voice. "Hallowed be thy name; thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…"

Cerberus lifted his dark head to look at her, his pale eyes focused on her face, head tilted in an almost quizzical expression – one ear folded over and the other pricked in order to hear more clearly. Something flickered to life behind those clever eyes, something that was almost close to human...but whatever it was quick repression covered it up when the animal noticed a fresh wave of sadness wash over the woman's trembling aura. Unshed tears made green eyes overly bright.

He leapt lightly, joining her on the bed and curling up beside her nearly the instant she dropped the book to the floor where it landed in a tumble of stiff pages, slipping from chilled, trembling fingers. Weak, weary and feeling oddly nauseous, Lilith let herself tip backward against the mattress, the dog's head nuzzling gently until it rested against the side of her face. Her eyes closed, tears sliding down her cheeks to dampen the black fur beneath her as Cerberus let out a heavy sigh, his warm breath ruffling her hair and drying the shiny leftover tear tracks trailing along her skin.

A quiet smile warmed the edges of her lips, a soft whisper lilting the air: "Deliver us from evil."

* * *

"Is this tolerable?"

Azrael's attention was torn, only half tuned to Uriel's spoken question while he studied the paved roads that stretched and twisted before them as they raced along so close to silence. Like wraiths, ghostly spirits of ages untold – they rose and fell with the land, crusaders of old set in a modern story, place, and time. Plucked out of a dusty past depicted in a legend. The city around them spiked bleak and drearily upwards, darkened by the storm clouds that swirled and rumbled above them as though throwing an inky tantrum; the sky appearing colored for his mood, angry, frustrated, brooding. "Hmm?" he made a soft noise of inquiry, roughly aware of the question interrupting his dry analysis.

Uriel tugged firmly on his gelding's reins, slowing the powerful warhorse's speed into a steady walk while the animal snorted and whickered, hooves clashing hard upon the cement beneath him. Azrael followed reflexively, his mare prancing with excitement brought by the hair-raising ride with her master and calmed quickly under the gentle stroke he laid to her velvety neck. The older angel gave his brother a penetrating look, dark, bottomless eyes sharp. "Will you fair without her? Perhaps she should be positioned more closely—"

"_No._" Azrael's tone was stern and unmoving – cutting the air like a blade through a block of iron. "I will be perfectly fine so long as I know she is safe and safety is wherever I am not, at least for the moment."

"If you are certain," Uriel murmured, his eyes flashing upward toward the spiral-carved ornamentation twisting up the sides of a nearby building. "I hope we face a brief and easy conflict for your sakes." The black gaze shifted to focus on Azrael's face rather then the black and blue bird that swept from the window sill of the office complex, its call low and mournful as it flew off toward the west, the way the elder was intended to go. "You can find your way to the gate, I trust?"

Azrael flicked a dismissive hand. "I should hope so. Cassiel will find me if I stray." They had stopped at an intersection just across from the point where the brothers would have to part ways and journey to where their respective lieutenants awaited their return. From there, the two entourages would travel to where they were needed: Uriel to his spies, Azrael to his soldiers, respectively. The crossroads was a call to an end of peaceful days. It was also a transition into territory neither angel had any desire to step into again.

Violet gaze steady, Azrael reached out to grip his brother's shoulder, gloved fingers squeezing just enough to relay a message of gratitude. Their eyes met, onyx melding with rapidly paling lavender – wisdom and death. Uriel's grave nod was his only reply before he swung his gelding around, the storm-gray charger tossing his head with relished excitement as the archangel kicked him into a hammering gallop toward the west. He was gone in another moment, leaving nothing but a feathery flash of scarlet in his wake.

Absently patting his mare's silky neck, Azrael turned in the saddle, allowing his keen eyesight to pierce one by one through the colossal structures that towered above him. Oppressive and challenging, it was a threat that he did not appreciate. Cities so crammed and packed with faux, flashy lights and loud, droning machinery had never been his forte. He had always preferred the lightly dispersed population and picturesque artistry of older European towns such as Volterra or Dresden. He favored naturalistic places, growing things, plants, and water; perhaps because he dealt with so much of the deceased, the colorless, and the drab. Perhaps it was why he had been so attached to life since the time of his creation.

Despite the overbearing weight of the city's ambience, he found that he wasn't quite ready to direct his path to the battlefield just yet. Instead, he turned his mare in another direction, nudging her into a quick, loping run toward the east. There was somewhere he wanted to visit first.

The church was an old building, once the proudest and most elegant of the structures settled at the more decrepit edge of the city during the days when religion had been a crucial part of life. It was a beautiful thing even still, gothic in design, complete with slender, snarling gargoyles and wrought iron traceries that crawled along its walls of dusky stone. Those iron designs had once served as trellises for roses and ivy, yet now they lay barren and cold, unmoving. A church that had seen better days, subjected to slow, decaying ruin as the people of the world moved on to pastimes that did not involve much worship or prayer. It remained, however, a tall, ideally placed observatory for those who could scale its walls – levels that had not been accessed by ordinary humans since its closure so many years ago.

No one knew quite why it still stood, since its value as a landmark was routinely questioned by those wishing for the space it used up. Secretly, the angels knew that the place was protected by spells strong enough to cause such unsavory attention to slide off its walls like drops of water. It was a

"_Ha'ane vitani__,_ Asphodel," Azrael murmured, dismounting after the mare drew to a quiet stop near the edge of the fenced-in garden surrounding the old chapel, stroking her velvety nose and smiling when she butted him affectionately in the shoulder.

The plants had already since begun the long hibernation that would sustain them through the winter. The blooms of snowdrop and winter rose were blooming, replacing the dogwood and clematis that would have twined, untended, about the pathways which led in a smooth circle about the building at its center. A garden of memory, time had not quite stopped all the way as there were still seasonal changes every few months, as with the rest of the world; yet the clock of hours seemed halted, stilled, rendered inconsequential in this place. The thin layer of frost coating the mosaic stone pathway crunched under his boots and was consumed by the heady breath of unaltered silence.

He passed by, observing the cold-hearty flowers and leaves with mild attention, and approached the weathered walls of the church. Ignoring the door altogether he located a section of the beaten iron that twisted in trellis-like patterns along the base of stone and winding upward like metal vines. This he reached for; gloved fingers smoothing over the cold metal with a touch of gentleness not far from a caress. He did not need a door. Allowing his fingers to close around the iron and planting a heel against the wall, braced and strong, he pulled himself up in the expert beginnings of what, for a mortal, could have been a long and dangerous climb.

It had begun to rain; water drops like tiny, liquid crystals falling from the darkened sky made stormy by a premature kind of twilight, one untouched by the stars. The lamps of heaven were closed off from the realm. Unsurprising, but daunting nonetheless. The first murmurs of thunder were rolling into threatening life behind the swirling clouds enfolded with black, sunless shadow. A protesting, aggrieved noise. Difficult to believe that it was truly six o'clock in the morning.

Azrael climbed onward, oblivious to the rain that soaked his pale hair and dripped down the angles of his face to bleed through the fabric of his clothes, making it cling to his body as though it had become attached to his skin. It was not a difficult journey; his stamina and strength carried him with well-balanced stability. He had taken this path before, preferring to labor his way up, relishing the energy expended and the pure physical sensation of work. Besides, it was conditioning. If he were to be involving himself in battle, he would be better off getting his body back into the state he required of it.

Leather gloves gripped, sturdy and sure, muscle and tendon flexing as he pulled himself up the rough stone construct that built the church amid the mass of crude metal and glass that was New York City. It was the soft spot of green, which twined around the old chapel, that granted the place its sense of solace and peace. But even this was a peace that didn't satisfy the hunger within his soul: a craving need that arose every time he left her.

Pain tore sharp and fierce through his left side as he pulled himself up onto the top ledge of the church walls, climbing to rest atop a piece of stone upon which a statue had once been seated, now broken and long since dispersed by the erosion of wind and rain. The final heave had forced his wound to split under stress. The pain was easily ignored and the blood flow was light, stopped by the bandaging he had wisely donned that morning. He granted it no more than a quiet sigh, breath leaving his mouth in the form of a chilled mist of white. Water trickled over him, a living, knowing gargoyle – a sentinel of the heavens.

Turning in a crouch, he looked down at the dark, brooding world that spread below him, perched there like a pale, watchful bird studying the designs of a plan he did not understand. _Always_ below him. Times like these made him feel the years that an eternal youth hid and a lasting spirit healed; trapped in an era that could not last. Times like these were the reason he had once loathed his own gifts. Yet nothing ever remained the same for very long.

"God is my shepherd, I shall not wander..." His lips barely moved with the shape of the words, eyes staring, unseeing, piercing the earth through with the gaze of time itself. Countless ages, countless hurt, countless sadness and grief and rage that had struck him through war and unwanted solitude.

Ever before his blood had been expendable, the same as spilling air, spilling water instead of blood; worthless, powerless, and loveless. But while not so long ago he had viewed such days through the eyes of despair…this duty, for some reason, was not held with agony. There was a worth to be found beyond the spilling of his own travesty of a life for the sake of virtue and honor and goodness; a peace only found on the other side of abhorred war. This time there would be no regret, no shame. He had always been a child of God, but now he had something not only to die for…but to _live_ for. For the first time in many long, dragging eons, Azrael could remember that once he had stood for things more important than blood and glory, and far more worthwhile than his own misery.

Rain come down, blade break his body and rob him of breath, strike him down and leave him to bleed into the blissful emptiness of a temporary ending – he had no more yearning for the taste of his own element. Death held no more relief for him. And because of that, it held all the more meaning.

Let it come. Forsaken though he once had seemed, he had never been completely abandoned.

A new presence sparked his attention, rising from the mist of wet and cold behind him; an unburdening interruption to the thoughts which haunted the stillness of his mind. The soft sound of an immortal's light, quick footsteps lit upon the stone adjacent to the steeple which jutted from the roof to stab at the sky like a knife. He reacted only with mental and spiritual acknowledgement, for it was an aura he recognized belonged to his lieutenant's steady, measured approach.

"Sir?"

It was not a question of his identity. Cassiel could read him were he several leagues away, so clear and strong was the mark of a Seraph. No, the question was of a ceremonious nature; that of an angel sent to assist a greater power, inquiring if he was prepared to go. It would be a quick journey; retrieve Asphodel, then perform the spells necessary to transport the three of them into the dimension between earth and nether that served as an immortal battleground.

"_Ichae,_ Cassiel." A light murmur; nearly drowned out by the pounding rain, an answer to the summons between the thrumming rhythm of the earth's war drums.

_Death shall walk with pride once more. _

"Sir." It was an assent this time, succinct and direct, a soldier's response; but it was laced with a certain fondness of a comrade. Cassiel's dark face was shrouded in shadow under his hood, but it was evident that he had a smile for his commander. "I am glad that you're back."

Azrael stood, scattering tiny crystal droplets from the folds of his clothing. He did not turn to the guardian, but when he answered, it was balanced with preparation and composure. "So am I, Cassiel." He tipped his face upward, neck bending gracefully at the base, and spread his arms as if to embrace the sky and the torrent of rain itself, breathing deeply while the light wind whipped gently at his damp hair. "So am I."

And he let himself fall, wings spread, into war.

* * *

_Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy love.__  
Send forth Thy spirit and they shall be created.  
And Thou shalt renew the face of the earth. _

* * *

**And here, my darlings, is the end of Mortal Heart Volume I. **

**I'm sorry for the delay in editing and posting this, school has really been kicking my ass these past few quarters. Having Creative Writing and Advanced Fiction Writing classes has been killer to my drive, and I'm doing this instead of my homework...though I have significantly no guilt about that. Hmm. Wonder why... I'm also going through some stressful times as far as work is concerned, or, rather, making sure I have a job after my present contract ends. Ugh.  
**

**I have no real firm guess as to when I'll have the first chapter of Volume II written and up. But I do have some strong ideas and a fairly solid plot-outline going for me, so I can promise that as soon as it's ready, it'll get posted for you. Just keep your eyes open for MH Volume II: Ethereal. **

**All right then, I think that's about all I have to report for now. I'd like to thank all of the reviewers who have been so faithful and patient and full of love. Remember that this story has most of its life because of you. **

**I'd also like to gently remind you to review! :D please please?**

**See you next time!!**


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